Dice, in a Game of War
by readerofasaph
Summary: In a world where divination is used to predict the future and govern nations, State Diviner Touya Akira and private investigator Waya Yoshitaka embark on a search for the heretic Sai, the ghostly diviner who may be the most powerful of them all.
1. Chapter 1

Touya Akira was waiting in my office when I came back from lunch. Until then it had been a rather good day.

He had broken and entered politely. The front door swung in, unlocked, when I tried the handle; stepping in, I found the room as I'd left it: the lights off, the curtains drawn, the air-conditioner emitting a breathy continuous drone of recycled air. Touya sat before my desk in the half-darkness, his back facing me. While I dealt with my mounting surprise, he stood up, turned, bowed and spoke:

"Waya."

A good detective is never at a loss for questions. A _great_ detective manages to make his questions sound socially appropriate; ergo, I floundered for seconds before deciding to go with: "What are you doing in my office?" (A classic query, not nearly as overused as people assume.)

Touya bowed again. If he meant to look apologetic, he failed. Touya has never managed to look humble to anyone in his entire life. In my office he was an offense of luxury against my faded painted walls, my bare furniture, the cramped and dreary dimensions of the room. Embroidered cream silk billowed out around his thin figure, making him seem larger than life. Ruby studs glimmered at his ears, and on his fingers rested the rings of a Diviner, one for each rank he had attained. He wore eight rings.

I sighed. "Suppose I can't blame you for deciding to come in; if you'd waited outside in this part of town, you'd have been robbed before you could even think of divining it." I flicked on the sole ceiling light and took my place behind the desk. "Sit down again and tell me what you came here for."

He did as I asked, folding his arms in his lap. "You will not like it."

He was still the same, still Touya, and it both worried and relaxed me. "I've never liked any surprise you brought me. Spit it out."

"I need you to find Sai."

All right, so the surprise was more unpleasant than usual. "You've got to be kidding." A stupid thing to say to Touya Akira, who wouldn't know a joke if if it pirouetted naked in front of him singing lewd lyrics. "Why?"

He hesitated. "Is this office secure?"

The question rankled, bringing to surface memories of inferiority, insecurity, and the eternal chasm between Touya and everyone else in the universe. "I'm good at my job. But don't take my word for it." I pulled open my desk drawer and extracted a plastic gridded board that had been folded in half, snapped it open. Stacks of tiny black and white magnetic rounds tumbled out. "Check for yourself. Nine-by-nine should do, right?"

I shoved the entire magnetic Weiqi set towards him. Several stones fell to the floor; I didn't care. Touya however, did. He bent down, picked them up, gathered all the black and white pieces into two piles, and then aligned the board so that one side was flush with the edge of the desk, frowning all the while.

Contrary to my expectations, he didn't chastise me.

He began to arrange the black rounds one at a time, picking up each stone between his index and middle fingers and making a composite geometric shape on the board that looked like a pentagon stuck to a square. It took ten stones to construct.

"Place a white stone," he said.

I used the Weiqi board in my line of work, on a weekly basis even, but I never touched it, never looked at it, without feeling a pang of – something. Not quite regret. A little bit of envy. Far too much resignation. I chose my move, and put my stone in the upper right star, at a diagonal opposite from his black design.

The board rattled, and the stones began to slide back and forth. We waited for their movements to settle. I watched Touya watching the board. His brow furrowed subtly. His breathing was very even. Perfect calm, perfect concentration. Nobody was better or more proper at this than he was. The sounds died down. The white stone was dead center, the black stones clustered around in brief arrangements of two and three.

"The place is secure," Touya said.

"I know." I bit back the urge to remind him that yes, I could read a divination, even if I was slower and less accurate than he was. Wasn't everyone slower and less accurate than he was? "Tell me why you're so keen to find Sai all of a sudden?"

"My father is missing." He said it in the tone of voice most people use for public announcements. "You've heard that the countrywide divinations have been unfavourable for the last several months?"

"Plague in the streets, blight on the crops – everyone's heard. Couldn't have missed the gossip if I tried. Your divining, I assume?"

"Of the State diviners, Ochi and Ashiwara were the first to see the coming disasters. Eventually I was asked to verify their results, and my work confirmed their foretellings." There are diviners who, over time, come to believe that their acts of divining themselves affect the futures that they see. No such moral quandaries for Touya Akira. "The Council of Oligarchs were determined to do something. Father decided to leave Ki, to see if a solution could be found elsewhere. But it's been months since we last heard from him. Worse still, I can't divine his location."

As a private investigator, I like to think I can read people's expressions. Touya, however, has always defeated all my expertise in this regard. So the fact that I could tell that he was worried meant that he was very worried. "You know, it's not all that unusual for divination to fail in locating people--"

"It's unusual for me."

Okay, so he was a very worried arrogant little prick. "You think Sai can help?"

"Father has probably gone to look for him."

"And failed?"

"I didn't say that."

I thought about the situation. It was clearly government business – unofficial, since Touya was here on his own. The kind of case I prefer to keep my nose well out of. On the other hand, the job involved the luxury of travelling (and I would make Touya pay the expenses) and a probably-generous fee. Plus if I succeeded, the Touya family would owe me one.

Besides, there was the possibility of meeting Shindou again.

"If you're not interested--"

"I'm interested. State your terms."

"I need you to find Sai within one month."

"One month? He could be anywhere in the world. We don't even know what country he's living in."

"Are you not up to the task?"

An easy hook to fall for, especially when spoken in Touya's haughty expressive voice. But I don't promise more than I can deliver. "I can try. I have as good a chance as anyone else dies. Better."

He reached inside that overdecorated dragon-and-phoenix robe of his and pulled out a cloth bag that jingled heavily when he placed it on the desk. "Five thousand credits upfront; another ten thousand if you succeed."

I'd known it was a big job; still, my eyes widened. "You know, you really shouldn't be walking around the city with that kind of money on your person."

"I expect regular reports," he said, ignoring my comment. Very well. He could do as he liked. He was scarcely defenseless. "You know which address to send it to."

"What about your father? Do you want me to find him?"

"...No." The pause was definite, but when I looked at Touya, his mouth was calm, his gaze steady. "I don't need to hear about it."

"As you wish." I shrugged. "I do as I'm paid to do."

The silence grew awkward. Touya said: "I regret that you were not able to join the State Diviners. You would have done well in our group."

I'd half-seen the blow coming. Even then, he couldn't have landed more squarely if he'd tried. "Diviner Touya, there are certain subjects I only allow certain people to mention to me. _You_ are not one of those certain people."

His almond-shaped, limpid eyes widened fractionally before he bowed his head. "My apologies for offending you. Unless you have any questions, I won't trouble you any longer."

A queasy sensation sat in my stomach as he left, the door clicking shut behind him.

I recognised the feeling for what it was: profound indigestion.

#

My name is Waya Yoshitaka. I am nineteen. For the last two years I've been a private detective in the city of Ki – the only independent private investigator in this city. In this business most people depend on patronage from the state, or one of the great houses (like say, the Touya family), to make ends meet. Me, I have a special reputation. So I make more money on freelance work than most - at least enough to keep me from bowing to the family I ran away from five years ago.

Most of my jobs are pretty mundane. At time of Touya's departure from my office, I had three unresolved cases. The first was the investigation of a merchant's wife, whose jealous husband was my client, who despite my best efforts appeared to be the one of the rare faithful women in the city of Ki. Nothing I said to reassure my client could convince him to stop paying me to shadow her on a daily basis. Not being in a position to complain about easy money, I had gone along with his demands so far.

I pulled out a letter-pad and fountain pen, wrote him to say that I was terminating our contract, and thought about the second case, a Divination request from Kuwabara Honinbou. Divinations make up over half of my income, and old man Kuwabara was one of my regulars. He didn't ask for my services all that often, but he paid handsomely when he did; in return, I didn't think too hard about _why_ he asked me to do divinations for him instead of, as Honinbou, ordering the State Diviners to do so. His requests ranged from topics as trivial as next week's weather to the guilt and innocence of criminals on death-row. I performed all of them using the glossy golden torreya wood board I'd bought as a preteen, that I kept hidden and locked in the cupboard behind my desk, and brought out only when absolutely alone; and sent my answers back with my usual disclaimers about Divination -- in the end, it only tells you what will probably happen, and not in a lot of detail.

Not that old man Kuwabara needed any lessons from me where Divination was concerned. I was constantly torn between questioning his motivations for sending me work (Leftover, misdirected interest in Sai? The joy and delight of being a pain in the ass?) and shutting up and accepting the badly needed money.

Money, we've already established, ranks much higher than curiosity on a private investigator's hierarchy of needs. I would perform the divination tonight, send the results and my bill to Kuwabara.

My third client was Isumi.

I finished my letter, signed it with a squiggle, and after furnishing it with stamp and envelope, flicked it into my empty plastic Out tray. Then I yanked open the file cabinet that sat beneath my desk drawer, drew out the dull pink manila folder marked "Isumi/Le Ping".

Inside the file was a sole telegram, the one Isumi had sent me three days ago: "Urgent case. Le Ping will visit pronto, bring details."

Last time I'd checked, Isumi and Le Ping lived in the city of Wuzi in Yih. From there, it took about two days to get to Ki by train, depending on the timetable, which meant that Li Ping might show up any minute now.

It wasn't as if I was looking forward to seeing Miniature Me again, but I needed to meet the brat for Isumi's sake.

Of course, it didn't mean I had to sit around eagerly awaiting his arrival.

I reached for the receiver of my black rotary-dial phone, listened to the monotone as I placed it to my ear, and began to turn the metallic wheel, digit by digit, retrieving an old number from a woolly crevasse of my memory.

I had begun my second search for Fujiwara no Sai. I was going to start with the most likely source.

Fujisaki Akari.


	2. Chapter 2

Fujisaki was as beautiful as I remembered. Dressed in a floaty, cotton, floral print dress and beribboned straw hat, her hair curled into ringlets on either side of her face, she looked like she'd stepped straight out of some oil painting of a pastoral scene. Only her lips were drawn together in a guarded line, and her smile, when I could coax it out of her, was half-hearted. We were having lemonade and ices in the tearoom at the hotel where we'd agreed to meet (I wasn't too comfortable paying her a direct visit, and the street outside my office was no place for a lady.)

She stirred at her drink with her straw, and I took advantage of the lapse in eye contact to think of another question to ask.

"So you haven't tried to contact Shindou since – well, two years ago?"

"I didn't even know where to start trying. He just disappeared. You should know, you were there when it happened."

"He was officially exiled by the Oligarchs, so I was one of the people chosen to see him off." I still remembered standing with Shindou, that evening at the city gates, helpless for words to say. Touya Akira had been there -- Kurata Atsushi too… the Meijin… the Honinbou… the Gosei. And the flickering, spooky outline of a ghost in sunset, silent as death, motionless until Shindou turned his back on us and started walking down the highway. Then it'd begun to follow him, and I caught one of those rare ephemeral glimpses of Sai in perfect focus: brilliant eyes, a sloping, graceful profile. "But I thought he might have told you where he was going, or whether he'd write to you. Something like that."

The shape of her mouth hardened. Her position on the matter of Sai had always been clear – or at least, her position on Shindou was clear, and that extended to Sai. "It's not like they gave him any time to make a plan."

"I don't blame you," she added a moment later, "You've always been Hikaru's friend."

Uncomfortable, I used my dessert spoon to gouge a hole in the raspberry sorbet sitting in front of me. I wasn't sure whether I was a friend to Shindou. Or whether I'd ever been. Shindou didn't tend to give people much chance to make up their mind about him either way. Everything about him had always been unfinished, uncertain, half in this world and half in another.

Shindou Hikaru. Spirit seer, ghost whisperer; the boy who walked among the living and the dead. No, I'd never really known him.

"Can you put me in touch with his family, at least?" I tried. "They might have some idea. Honestly, even knowing which country he's in would help at this point."

She thought about it. Within its decorative glass bowl, her fruit-and-muscadine ice was beginning to turn into a puddle.

"I'll introduce you to his mother and grandmother. If you insist," she said finally. "But please don't bother them more than you have to. The last two years have been very difficult for them; they never really understood what happened."

"That's not surprising. Most days I don't feel like I understand it too well either."

"Hikaru didn't do anything wrong!"

_He kind of did_, I wanted to say, but I could see that it was useless. I'd have to make sure she never found out that Touya Akira was the one hiring me for this case. "It'd be great if I could talk to his grandfather at least. That's who Shindou got his abilities as a spirit medium from, right?"

She nodded. "It runs in the family. I think I can arrange for you to meet him tomorrow afternoon, if you have the time?"

"Sure."

She started eating her dessert, finally, scooping up pieces of peach and nectarine in melted orange liquid and chewing on them delicately. "Waya, do you really think you can find Hikaru?"

Her left hand was resting on the table. I glanced at the discreet wedding band on its fourth finger, and then at her face, all hopeful-painful and lovely and feminine. "I can do it if anyone can," I said, and inwardly wondered, _but what good will it do you_?

`

#

Upon arrival I discovered that my office had been broken into for the second time that day. The lock was unforced, the door slightly ajar. Whoever my visitor was this time (and he had to have been a rather good burglar, since this time I'd actually locked the place properly before leaving) had thought to announce his arrival.

I went inside and found the room completely silent and dark.

Instantly I reached for the light switch, and the bulbs were just flicking on when a minor whirlwind barrelled into me and pinned me to the floor before I had time to react. The linoleum jarred painfully against my hipbones, and I winced.

Brightness flooded my vision, but the weight atop me didn't seem to be moving. I blinked and saw my own face smiling smugly down at me,

"I grew taller," Le Ping announced.

I sighed and began shoving him off me. Fortunately he seemed happy to cooperate, now that he'd successfully startled me.

"You could have knocked," I grumbled, clambering to my feet. He followed suit. Once I'd composed myself we went through the traditional ritual of checking each other out – height, weight, new scars, changes in complexion, anything that would make us look more or less like each other. "How old are you now, fifteen? How did you get so tall so soon?"

"I'm the exact same height as you." Le Ping grinned. "We can switch identities for real now." He had been nursing fantasies of pulling a switcheroo since the first time we met.

"Not unless you learn how to speak Ki dialect without a horrible accent, and not until your voice stops breaking." I smirked at him. "But I'm glad to see you grew up so good-looking. Who taught you how to pick locks?"

"It was Yang Hai." His eyes looked one way and then the next, as his attention darted from one corner of the office to another. He'd always been unremittingly restless. Every time I met him I thanked the forces of Chaos and Order that he was Isumi's problem and not mine. "Your place is so boring. Aren't you going to buy some new decorations soon?"

"If I had that kind of money to burn, I'd rent a fancier office." I sat down in my armchair. "Anyway, what sort of case do you have for me?"

He took the seat opposite me and leaned forward, arms folded on the desk, face all wide and earnest and damn it, with _my_ eyes – the kind of eyes I used to turn on Isumi or Morishita when I wanted them to do something – usually buy me food, actually.

"Isumi misses you," he said simply.

At once I felt something hard and prickly and dried out inside me, rapidly turning into soft gooey warmth.

I attempted to say something, failed, tried and failed again, then finally managed to come up with, "I miss him too."

Le Ping threw me a complacent grin. "So move to Wuzi."

"Don't be an idiot; that's impossible."

"Why not? You work for yourself, right?

"Being self-employed doesn't mean you can do whatever you like. I'd have to rebuild my client base and information network from scratch, you know."

"You could do it. You have Isumi and Yang Hai over there. And me. I have influence." He said it so seriously and sincerely that I wanted to laugh, before my gaze fell on the golden torque that hugged his neck. Yes, Le Ping had influence. A great deal more than I did.

"It'd still be a lot of work. Ki's my home. I love it here."

Le Ping gave me his best _stop bullshitting me already_ look. I frowned. So what if I had excuses? Didn't mean that I wanted to admit that I had excuses, in front of this kid. I changed the subject. "But enough about me. You're here because of the telegram, right?"

The shift in his mood was startling; I hadn't thought the brat capable of looking serious. "Lu Li been accused of manslaughter."

He paused, giving me time to digest the information. "Wait wait wait. You mean, like _Imperial Diviner_ Lu Li? Who was killed?"

"Wang Shi Zhen. His body was found in one of the interior palaces, open only to palace staff and diviners." He did not look at me as he spoke. "Yang Hai says that if I hadn't been out on a mission at the time, I'd be a suspect as well."

An Imperial Diviner, accused of the death of another Imperial Diviner. This was big news. International news. "It sounds like an internal affair of the Yih Empire, to be honest. What does Isumi want me to do?"

"Isumi insists that you _have_ to get involved. The evidence is feeble, and nobody has any idea how to proceed. The entire palace is in an uproar. This case could end up being as big as Sai."

_Sai. _The two syllables that would haunt me my whole life.

"And that's not all, too. Some of our divinations have been failing recently."

The pattern recognition areas in my brain starting flashing. "You too? Since when?"

"Sometimes we can't get a reading from the boards. Other times, the readings are wrong – wait." Le Ping has a pretty good detective's mind as well; sometimes, I felt like his talents were wasted on divination. "It's happened in Ki, too?"

"I met Touya Akira today. He told me that some of his divinations haven't been working lately." Granted, Touya's divination attempts had been related to the search for Sai, and if _Sai_ was involved then failure of auguries was a distinct possibility. On the other hand, my knowledge of chaos and order studies was pretty encyclopaedic, and _until_ the Sai case had surfaced, there had only been a few records of board-divination failing in all of world history.

"Then Yang Hai was right. This is big. Waya," he looked up at me, intent, and it was exactly the way I used to look, back when I had been with Morishita and I'd believed in goodness and the world and the authority of the State, "It's not Isumi. I, too, think we need your help."

"You're not giving me much of a choice, are you? All right then, I'll need you to give me a more detailed story. But first, let's get something to eat. You'll be rooming with me while you're in Ki, right?" I nodded at the small brown trunk that he'd left leaning against the bookcase. "I hope you don't mind the couch, because that's all you're getting."

"No way!" He pulled a face. "Beauty before age."

"Pearls before swine, you little twerp. You like sushi, right?" I sailed out the door and then stopped for a moment, considering the need to install a new lock. It wasn't as if I kept anything of sentimental (or even material) value inside my office, but at this rate my reputation as a detective was going to be ruined.

"I want bacon and eggs," Le Ping insisted, as I headed down the front steps.

"That's a breakfast food, shrimp," – I said, grinning upwards at him; he was standing on the step above me. "Wait until morning; I'll take you to this diner just outside my flat. It's cheap and greasy and amazing."

But in the morning we had no time for anything like breakfast.


	3. Chapter 3

I was up early the next day. I went to the kitchen and put water on to boil, then tugged open the slats of the venetian blinds, allowing a pale bluish light to filter in. Over the breakfast counter I saw Le Ping sprawled out on the sofa, his limbs further spread than I'd thought possible on that small piece of furniture. He was belly-down, one arm hanging over the edge of the seat, legs scissored at an odd angle. A subtle, oddly endearing snore emitted from him with each breath.

A minor sleep shortage never hurt a teenager, I decided, and reached up towards the shelf where the wireless sat, switching it on. The news was just starting. Le Ping started to stir the moment the announcer's scratchy, masculine voice came on – in tandem with the low whistle of the kettle reaching optimum temperature, it was starting to get pretty noisy in here. I got out two tin mugs and shook some tea leaves into each, and when Le Ping padded over, finally awake, I tipped steaming water into both and handed him his drink.

"It's hot," he complained. He was alert and bright-voiced. Evidently a morning person. Fortunately, so was I.

"Shut up and drink. Caffeine first thing in the day is good for your critical faculties."

"What about breakfast?" But he drained the mug in one gulp anyway, then immediately started a choking fit when it had trouble going down.

"Idiot." I thought about thumping him on the back to make him suffer more, then decided it was too dangerous. Instead I went to the sink and filled a glass with water for him, just in case (at this point I had no idea whether it would make the problem better or worse.)

On the wireless, the man speaking paused, before continuing in a speedier, excited tone: "...and in breaking news, the body of the Ouza was discovered in the Shrine of Profound Darkness early this morning. Zama Ouza, aged 51, was in the middle of a three night vigil as part of the preparation for this year's midsummer festivities when tragedy struck suddenly and mysteriously last night. While the Council of Oligarchs has yet to release an official statement regarding the death, police sources have confirmed that foul play is a possibility."

Sometime during that announcement, Le Ping had managed to stop coughing. His brow furrowed tight as we both went still for ten or so seconds, listening hard; but that was all the wireless had to say on the subject. I turned it off after the conversation switched to baseball and weather forecasts.

"So what do you think?" Le Ping broke in impatiently. "That sounds _way_ suspicious. And far too coincidental."

"It could be nothing. For all we know, Zama Ouza's fondness for port finally caught up with him, and he died of liver failure. But, I reckon I ought to be taking a professional interest anyway. Get dressed; we're going to the Council House."

He was already extracting clothing and towels from the luggage he'd left open on the floor. He moved quickly, I'd grant him that.

"It's just weird; you know what I told you about Lu Li last night--" he said, halfway through the bathroom doorway.

"Yes, yes. Don't jump to conclusions. And leave the toilet seat up when you're done, I prefer it that way."

#

We decided to walk to the Council House. At our pace it took thirty minutes' travelling time. A gaggle of journalists and inquisitive third parties had already formed around the marble steps at the entrance when we got there, and as I came closer I saw that a temporary barricade had been erected across the white portico that fronted the building's bronze double doors.

I pushed my way to the front of the crowd and came up to the first row of columns, where several Council staff in black and white robes were standing guard. Pausing, I checked whether Le Ping had made it through the flock of bystanders. I needn't have worried, from the looks of things; the kid had extremely talented and annoying elbows.

I nodded at a titian-haired young man who was lolling against the barricade. "Hey Komiya," I said. "Do you think you could let me in?"

He blinked owlishly at me. "Oh hey, Waya. Long time no see. Guess you're here for the Ouza investigation? Did they call you in?"

I shook my head. "I'm here on my own. Can I come and have a look?"

"Sure, no problem. The Shrine's closed off at the moment, but I'll leave you to figure _that_ out on your own. Is that your twin brother?" he asked, squinting at Le Ping, who was stomping his way towards us.

"No way!" Le Ping glared at Komiya. "I'd never be that ugly."

I smacked Le Ping on the head. "Tell me that the next time you beg for us to pull a switch."

Komiya was studying Le Ping's throat. "That's a Yihian Imperial neck ring," he said confusedly.

"He's a Yihian Imperial Diviner. I know it's hard to believe. Is it okay if he comes with me?" I asked. "He's smarter than he looks. Maybe we can trick old man Kuwabara into thinking he has double vision."

Komiya arched a brow at me. "_You're_ smarter than you look, too. "

"I'll choose to take that as a compliment," I said, stepping over the barricade. "Thanks, Komiya; I owe you one."

#

The maze of hallways and passages within the Council House was all too familiar to my feet. I hurried on, Le Ping right behind me, eyeing the coffered ceilings, the heavy dark carpets, the gilded mirors lining wide corridors. As far as I could tell, nothing had changed in the last two years, save for my relationship to the State of Ki.

"This place is kind of...small," Le Ping pronounced, after we'd made it past the initial stretch of vestibules and were well into the labyrinth of doors and staircases that led to the interior shrines.

"Compared to the Yihian Palace I suppose it is." I spotted Nase and Fuku coming out of a meeting chamber and rounded the corner rapidly, so as to avoid meeting them. I _hate_ awkward conversations. "Not quite so many concubines and ladies-in-waiting to house. Nearly there now--" We carefully stepped over a wooden doorsill that I'd tripped over several times during my time here as a novice, took a shortcut through a servant's passageway, and then we were there – in the Sky's Origin, a hexagonal domed room that terminated at its highest point in a massive oculus, a circular hole left completely open to the elements.

As boys we'd snuck into this place together, Isumi and Shindou and I, to hold midnight feasts and and review our studies and then finally, when we got tired, lie on our backs on the black marble floor, watching the stars.

I shook off memory and surveyed the current situation. The Sky's Origin was teeming with people: diviners, policemen, servants, senators. I searched the throng of familiar faces, trying to spot someone I could question for more information. Touya Akira was standing next to a tall urn, amid a group of senators twice his age. He angled his head slightly as I glided past, and his green eyes widened briefly when he spotted Le Ping, but he set his jaw, and continued talking to the grey-bearded man in front of him. Typical. I moved on.

A few yards away, State Diviners Morishita and Saeki were holding a lively and heated discussion. Morishita appeared thunderous, his arms folded across his chest.

Well, _that_ wouldn't do either. My footsteps quickened.

"Waya?" I turned at the sound, but it was Le Ping who had been accosted, by a young, sleepy-gazed man in an indifferent haircut. Le Ping was glaring, throwing off the young man's cotton-sleeved hand.

"Of course _not_. Isn't it obvious who the superior version is?"

"Yes, one of us has brains and the other doesn't," I interrupted acidly. "Fuku, this is Le Ping; you've probably heard Isumi raving about him before. Mini-Waya and all that."

"I remember!" The puzzlement in Fuku's face cleared a little. "But Waya, what are you doing here?"

"Can you get us into the Shrine of Profound Darkness?" I asked.

He frowned and then pointed at the northern end of the room. In front of the oval door set into the wall there hung a long yellow band of crime scene tape. "The police have been there all morning. The only people who've been allowed in are the State Diviners."

"Who's in charge of the investigation? Amano? That's all right, I'll clear it with him." _Possibly_, I added mentally. Amano was pretty used to me bowling my way into police business anyhow. "You coming, Le Ping?"

As we ducked beneath the tape barrier, it occurred to me that having a Yihian Imperial Diviner enter the Shrine of Profound Darkness unauthorised might possibly be grounds for a diplomatic incident. Ah well, too late now. Le Ping was probably hunting for new notches on his belt of bratty achievements anyway.

Pushing the door open, I breathed the air of the shrine, and let the old feeling of fear-which-was-not-fear envelope me.

The Shrine of Profound Darkness is the heart of the Council House. It is biconvex in shape, floored and walled in obsidian, and completely bare except for nine larger-than-life Weiqi boards, arranged in a perfect square, all made of smoky garnet with black grids drawn in tourmaline. There is something about the room's acoustics that absorbs all sound, so that even at that moment, with half a dozen police detectives and several diviners in official robes pacing around, it felt unnaturally hushed.

The lighting in the shrine is always dim. It took some time before I could see anything clearly, and by the time my eyes had adjusted, I noticed Ichiryuu Kisei advancing on me.

Immediately I dropped into a genuflect, reaching out to pull Le Ping in to the same position – but there was no need, the kid had noticed and was already kneeling. I let my arm fall away from Le Ping and fixed my eyes downwards.

"Stand up," said the Kisei sharply. "What are you doing here?"

In my head the Kisei had always been a bald, genial man with a ready supply of bad jokes and terrifying powers of divination. Right then all I could remember was the terror. I pulled myself to my feet, gaze still lowered. I tried not to feel fourteen years old.

"Waya!" The sound of Amano's voice reassured me a little, just enough that I could lift my head. "You'll have to excuse him, Kisei; he's a private detective, one of the best. He's helped us with dozens of cases in the past."

"Has his presence here been authorized by one of the State Diviners?"

"My apologies," I said. "I thought it was best to come here as soon as possible, while the evidence was still fresh."

Ichiryuu humphed and peered at Le Ping. "And who are you, his brother?"

Le Ping said haughtily: "I am Le Ping of the House of the Golden Dragon, a servant of the Eternal Dynasty, one who watches order and observes chaos, here as a representative of the Son of Heaven."

I made a wholehearted attempt to sink into the earth and disappear. Grounds for a diplomatic incident? Le Ping _was_ a living diplomatic incident.

The Kisei's eyes narrowed. "You wear the imperial torque. Why wasn't I notified of your arrival?"

"My apologies, Kisei. I was the one who received the notification from Yang Hai, the Yihian Privy Minister of Internal Affairs." The voice cut into the conversation like a tempered blade slicing through air. Touya stepped into our circle, a thin neat dark figure. "The letter was directed to the Meijin's office, and since it was labelled as requiring immediate attention, it was passed on to me."

Okay, that was new information. I was about to shoot Le Ping a death-glare for withholding facts from me, when I caught the faint surprise that passed across the boy's face. Aha, so Yang Hai had outplayed him this time.

"Detective Waya is also here at my request," Touya continued.

The Kisei looked the opposite of happy. It seemed like the rumours about his jealousy of the younger Touya were true. "Well, if you've chosen to let them in, I'll leave it up to you to handle it. Your responsibility, do you understand?"

Touya bowed. "Please don't worry. I'll handle this to the best of my ability."

The tension seemed to linger in the air a while; then the Kisei shrugged and stepped back. "I have to go for a meeting," he said, walking towards the door. "Touya, if you could prepare a report on this for the Council. _Including_ our two unexpected guests."

"Certainly."

With Ichiryuu gone everyone relaxed a little. I smiled at Amano, said: "If you don't mind, Inspector, could you tell me what you've discovered so far? I notice they've already removed the Ouza's body from the shrine."

"Of course." Amano reached into a coat pocket and brought out his beloved notepad. "I'm glad Diviner Touya thought of getting you involved. Should have thought of calling you earlier. Divination mysteries are your specialty after all."

"...is this a divination mystery? I thought we were still thinking good old mundane murder."

Amano checked his notes. "There were no signs of a struggle, and no marks on the Ouza's body except for what looked like third-degree burns on his fingers. Small and round, as if the divination stones had started burning him. The doctors said we couldn't rule out a sudden unexplained cardiac arrests, but still-- he wasn't known to have any health problems. Oh, and he was sitting in _seiza_ when the diviners discovered him this morning. Frozen in perfect position, with his hand outstretched to play. There was a black stone stuck between his fingers. It left a burn mark when we peeled it away."

Sharp intake of breath from Le Ping.

"I was keeping vigil outside the entrance with Saeki from midnight last night, until dawn, when we found Diviner Zama's body," said Touya. "We were watching the whole night. And besides that oval door, there is no possibly entryway to the shrine."

I automatically resented the fact that he looked perfectly fresh and alert despite having stayed up all night. Old trigger reaction, finding new things to hate about Touya every time I saw him. "Well, you never know, it could be a ghost."

Touya's eyes flashed.

Le Ping was examining the central Weiqi board in the nine-by-nine square. "This is where he was working when he died, right?"

I followed him over. The board featured an intricate but incomplete divination pattern. A few stones appeared to have fallen off the board into the floor – two white pieces near the eastern side of the board, where the body outline of the Ouza had been chalked out, and a black one that appeared to have just barely rolled off the western edge of the grid. Two uncovered bowls sat nearby, one filled with black slate stones and one filled with white clamshell.

"We've also collected the black stone that the Ouza was about to play, as evidence," said Amano. "I can show it to you later, if you drop by the station."

I puzzled over the arrangement. "Le Ping, can you read that board? It looks meaningless to me, but if you account for the four missing stones... then there's about a hundred possibilities."

Le Ping nodded. "But most of the possible readings wouldn't make any sense in this situation, right? Like, there's no way the white stones would be in the upper left corner for a love prediction, or even here-- there's definitely only about twenty readings of this board that seem likely."

"Eighteen," said Touya Akira, coming forward. Le Ping scowled at him. Good to see that Touya's talent for pissing people off was still in full force. "Please don't forget that given the unusual circumstances and location of the divination, we should still be prepared for unexpected readings."

"Has anyone measured the chaos-order balance in the room, to calibrate the divinations?" I asked.

Touya nodded at the southwestern board, where Ochi and Ashiwara were placing stones. "The State Diviners are trying to determine that right now."

"Looks like we'll have to wait, then." I studied the board again, rapidly memorising the pattern of the stones. "Inspector Amano, is it okay if I ask you a few more questions?"

"Certainly. Perhaps it'd be better to do this outside? My men are still examining the scene, and it's getting a bit crowded in here."

"I'd like to discuss this board with Diviner Touya," said Le Ping, throwing a challenging stare at Diviner Touya.

"If you'd like," Touya replied coolly. I managed a weak grin as Amano and I headed out. Hopefully when I came back to pick up Le Ping neither of them would be deceased or permanently maimed.

#

Shindou's grandfather was thin and old but less withered than I'd expected. His handshake was brisk, his voice firm, and when I introduced myself as an old classmate of Shindou's, his demeanour was equal parts friendly and cranky. He brought me to the wooden porch overlooking the backyard of his austere, traditional home. We sat cross-legged and drank jasmine tea from china cups. There was a torreya Weiqi board next to the wall.

"You're the novitiate," he said. "Morishita's protégé, right? The one who testified in the Sai tribunal."

I inclined my head. "Guilty on all counts. Although I stopped being a novitiate after that."

"Because of the verdict?" When I confirmed it, the old man sighed. "You're a good boy, but you needn't have. I was there, I saw it too. Council did the best they could with what they had. My daughter's never gotten over it, but doesn't mean that they made the wrong choice."

"The best they could wasn't good enough," I said, eventually.

The old man sighed. "Ghosts are always difficult to manage. And the older they are the more dangerous they are. This dead diviner, this Sai – he's been haunting Weiqi boards for a thousand years. That shows an immense determination"

"Have you tried to look for Shindou in the last two years?"

"He lived in Yih for a while, in the countryside. His mother went to see him last autumn – that was oh, eight months ago? But that's the last time we heard from him; he moved elsewhere. Hasn't written to us since." His face turned dark. "Mitsuko said that when she was there the ghost looked almost solid. She could actually talk to him."

"Sai – taking corporeal form? That's incredible." How much had Shindou and Sai learned in two years? What could they _do_ with a Weiqi board, nowadays?

"It's _wrong_ that's what it is." He turned a hawklike stare on me, and I was reminded briefly of the way Shindou looked when he had his mind set on something. "The dead are meant to stay dead. And the dead who want to live again are the worst kind of dead."

"What if he was right, though?" The reason I'd quit the novitiates in the aftermath of the Sai tribunal. Not just because Shindou was my friend, not just out of guilt, but also because-- "I don't mean that he's right about wanting to be immortal. But about wanting to find the pinnacle of divination. The true human purpose of watching order and chaos."

"I'm a medium, not a diviner. All I know is that he wanted to stay alive longer than his allotted lifespan. And that's wrong for any ghost. I don't care what his reasons were. Hikaru was a good boy. A normal boy. I told Masao he had the talent, that he should have been trained at the temple, but they wanted him educated in the modern way. So of course the ghosts visited him. They always do, when there's somebody who'll listen to them."

"Shindou was." I hesitated. "Shindou was the most talented novitiate I knew. Even when he was divining on his own, without help of Sai, his intuition for the board was brilliant."

He snorted. "That's meaningless to us now."

"Is he still in Yih, do you know?" I said.

"Perhaps. I can tell you one thing, you'll find Hikaru some place where the spirits are strong. Certain geomantic outlines of chaos and order are favourable to the dead."

"Is that so." I stood. "Thank you very much. I'll keep you informed if I manage to find Hikaru."

"Thank you. I'd like that. For his mother's sake, at least." But, I thought, observing the way the lines on his face shifted, he was grieving his grandson as much as anyone else was.

Feeling awkward, I made my farewells swift.

#

Le Ping was practically bouncing off the walls of the front vestibule when I got back to the Council House. In the end he'd spent the entire day there, analysing divination readings, while I headed first to the police station, to the hospital and then to visit Shindou's grandfather.

"Have you gone to see the body already?" he demanded. "I want to go with you!"

"It's in the morgue. The clerk there wasn't too convinced by my credentials when I introduced myself; we'll have to wait until the autopsy report comes out, from the looks of things." I was poor at assessing bodies anyway – there weren't nearly as many homicide cases in P.I. work as one would imagine. "It'll probably take at least a few days."

Le Ping's face fell. "But we won't have time for that!"

"Patience, kid. What do you mean, we won't have _time_--" My sentence fell away as I felt a familiar, knifelike presence behind me.

"We're going to Yih," said Touya Akira.


	4. Chapter 4

_When it's altogether primal chaos,  
how do you see the shape of things?_

As usual, Touya got what he wanted. Midnight saw the three of us ensconced in a first-class carriage westernbound for the Yihian capital. It was the most luxurious train ride I'd ever been on, although that wasn't saying much. The leather seating was maroon, commodious, and slumber-inducing; Le Ping was already out like a light. I was too disgruntled to feel sleepy.

Touya sat opposite us, forming patterns on a magnetic board balanced in his lap. If he was exhausted from last night's vigil – and he must have been – he did not show it. I watched his jewelled fingers move along the grid, adjusting a stone here, a stone there. His nails were clipped indifferently, and very short; he was not vain, despite his formal, angular beauty.

We were silent together into the early hours of the morning. I had nothing to say to him that I could express without anger, and he, presumably, was done giving me instructions for now. The rhythmic rumbles of the train continued without variation as we sped out of Ki. At some point I pressed my face to the window; it was cloudy and moonless, and I could see nothing besides the indistinct black silhouettes of trees and boulders, visible briefly until we slid past and left them far behind.

Touya has always been good at ignoring the world when he wishes to do so. I, on the other hand, am a compulsive cataloguer of my surroundings. It made for a poor combination when stuck together in a confined space, travelling at ninety miles per hour, with only each other and a dozing teenage boy for company.

"What are you divining?" I asked, observing the shapes on the Weiqi board shift and shuffle, cycling through an endless series of variations. The formations looked oddly familiar, yet resisted all my attempts to decipher them.

Touya's hand stilled. "I don't know."

Startled by his words, I took a second look at the goban. It was a full nineteen-by-nineteen, and sat precariously on his knees; he had already placed more than a hundred stones on the intersections. Familiar, but no divination pattern that I could recognise.

My eyes widened. "You _didn't._"

His face was unreadable. "I haven't yet succeeded."

"Even the Touya name won't save you if this gets out."

He shrugged, apparently indifferent. Next to me, Le Ping shifted in his sleep, lolling his head against my shoulder.

"How long have you been working at this?" I asked.

"Since he left."

I heard the subtle crack in his voice, and knew he was not talking about his father.

#

"_Are you Sai?" Over the months I had learned that Shindou was an accomplished liar with one fatal weakness; his face was extremely reactive. Catch him off-guard, in the right place at the right time, and his eyes would tell you everything. The moment was fleeting but revelatory._

Today he defused the situation with a contrived yawn. "Knock it off, Waya. Are you really bored or something? I'm getting really tired, trying to convince you of, you know, the truth."

He sat on the floor of his room, fretfully pushing stones around a wooden goban resting between his splayed legs. I lay sidewise on his bed, head propped against my left arm. "You got any clues who he might be, then?"

He flicked a stone to the opposite wall, as if it were a carrom disk. "Someone with access to the Council House, obviously."

"That only narrows it down to about three hundred people." My eyes traced Shindou's arched back, his restless hands; but the opening had passed. "Maybe he'll send us another miraculous divination and we can catch him in the act."

"I hope not." He was wearing a novitiate's robe, and he used its broad sleeve to sweep the board clean. Of all of us, he was the least reverent towards the act of divining. "Sai only announces an augury when there's a disaster that the State Diviners have failed to foresee, right? That means we'll only hear from him again if something bad is about to happen."

"He could always change his modus operandi." I helped him gather the fallen pieces into their bowls. When we were done he immediately began marking out the board again.

"You're awfully fond of starting at tengen," I observed. "Why? It's a rather odd way to divine." Conventional methods of divination required that you place the black and white stones to reflect the chaos-order balance of the situation you were trying to decipher – black for order, white for chaos. Very few destinies were tipped so strongly towards one side of the equation that they had to be represented with a piece at dead centre.

"Because it's the origin of heaven. You have to assert control over the universe, if you want to suborn it."

I frowned at his logic. "That's weird. You're weird, Shindou. Where did you get an idea like that?"

"Don't know. Some book somewhere, I guess." He scattered five stones on the board. They began to clack and spin, rippling across the wood. 

#

Breakfast was fried kipper and greasy eggs on toast, served with a choice of coffee or tea. Predictably, Le Ping asked for seconds.

"Are you _sure_ you grew up on imperial court cuisine?" I eyed him askance. "Your palate doesn't seem at all discriminating."

"Shut up." He spoke with his mouth full. "I need my calories so I can grow up to be taller than you."

"It's healthy practice for a man to harbour one or two impossible fantasies." I changed the subject. "Tell me more about Wang Shi Zhen."

"Should we wake him up first?" Le Ping nodded at Touya, who was visibly drooping at the dining table; his body seemed to have finally caught up with him.

"I can always write him a report. He's paying for it, after all. Still, we should probably get him out of here before he wrecks those fancy clothes of his."

Getting Touya out of his torpor and persuading him to walk the ten or so yards to our carriage was easy enough; although he spent most of those ten yards slouched against me.

"I'd love a camera right about now," I muttered, shifting my chin so that it didn't collide with his forehead. It occurred to me that I was awfully used to doing this – only with Shindou, not with Touya.

I hauled Touya into his seat and sank into my own. Li Ping joined us, stared at the ground, and said, "Shi Zhen joined the Imperial Diviners same time as me."

Oh. Right. What would Isumi say? Probably something that only worked when Isumi said it. "That really sucks."

"Lu Li didn't do it. He's not the type."

"At the risk of offending you, can I suggest that you don't really have the experience or capacity to evaluate whether someone is capable of murder?"

"_Cui bono_. He has nothing to gain from it. Shi Zhen was the one who..." He trailed off. He was young. I taunted him for it all the time, but sometimes, at important times, I forgot.

"I think his death was caused by divination." We weren't going to Yih to figure out who murdered Wang Shi Zhen; we were going to Yih to find Shindou Hikaru. Or at least the trail of his passing. But if I was right, and Touya Akira was right, we were going to kill a dozen birds with one stone.

"The emperor will never believe that. Even Yang Hai and Isumi..."

"If that's the truth, then there'll be proof. Gathering proof is what I do for a living." I flipped him a smirk. Inside, I was crushingly aware of how meaningless my gestures were. A friend was dead; the _how_ and _who_ didn't matter.

"_I_ don't believe it. Divination can't kill people."

"It's not supposed to. It's not supposed to bring people back to life, either. I'm guessing you've never heard the full story about Sai. The true story." He shook his head. "Then, that should be remedied. The sooner the better."

#

When Touya woke up that afternoon and resumed the experiments with his Weiqi board, Le Ping immediately interrupted by slamming a white round down next to the lower left star.

"Let's try it with this," he said, pulling a half credit coin out of his purse. He cast it up; it spun, suspended in midair, and dropped down.

Touya hesitated, his long-lashed eyes dark and inscrutable, and then gave one of his cold arrogant smiles. "Okay."

Touya retrieved a quarter from somewhere inside his robes; Li Ping found another board. I avoided thinking about inquisitions.

Hanged for a sheep, hanged for a lamb. After the coins had landed double-heads for the eleventh time in a row, I reached for my own fold-up goban, tucked away in my trenchcoat, and joined them.


	5. Chapter 5

_Blazing radiance and utter darkness  
and nothing more: how did it happen?_

Isumi was waiting on the platform when we arrived. Preoccupied with the unexpectedly complicated task of retrieving my suitcase from the overhead rack, I was the last to see him. I emerged from the carriage just as Le Ping was attempting to strangle Isumi in a bear hug. He was nearly as tall as Isumi now. Which meant that _I_ was nearly as tall as Isumi now.

"I've told the porter to take your things to the car," Isumi said, extricating himself from Le Ping's clutches. "Hullo, Waya."

He smiled and I was happy, happy, happy. By now it was such an unfamiliar sensation that for a minute, I didn't know what to do.

"Will we be able to gain an audience with the emperor tomorrow?" inquired Touya.

Isumi nodded. "I arranged one as soon as I received your telegram." Like Touya, Isumi was dressed in official state robes, all sheen and gold thread and satin colour. Le Ping, on the other hand, wore too-long jeans and an open black jacket. His torque flashed bright and conspicuous at his collar. As the other passengers disembarked and came wandering through, I grew uncomfortably aware of the attention we were getting.

Isumi noticed as well. "Let's get moving," he suggested, pushing gently at the small of my back.

Outside, the moon was in a quarter-phase. Near the taxi stand, a uniformed man was loading our baggage from a wide trolley into the trunk of a black saloon car. We got in. Isumi took the front passenger seat; I ended up sandwiched between Touya and Le Ping.

"You can stay at the consulate tonight, if you like," Isumi told Le Ping.

The streets of Wuzi were narrow, the shophouses huddled together in cramped terraces. Nearly every building featured casement windows, wooden and slatted, with adjoining ledges that displayed rows of potted plants or, occasionally, oddly, worn shoes or broken toys. Streetlamps winked at most corners. There were more pedestrians walking about than I would expect at the same hour in Ki.

"Remind me to take you to a night market while we're here," Isumi said. "Nearly there now. By the way, Yang Hai's coming to supper."

Le Ping made a noise resembling a dying animal.

"Don't worry. He's not mad at you."

"I'm the one who's mad at him!" Folding his arms across his chest, he remained disgruntled until we arrived some twenty minutes later at the consulate, a quirky but tasteful hybrid of Ki and Yihian architecture. The entranceway was paved in granite and lined with stone lions sejant on marble plinths.

Isumi showed us to our rooms. When we finally got to mine, he lingered in the doorway, one hand resting against the doorframe, as I took in the postered bed, the extravagantly corniced ceiling, the handpainted scrolls that hung against the walls.

"This kind of thing really reminds me how much money I'm missing out on." My words came off harsh. His smile faded. I wanted to kick myself.

He was the one to break the silence some seconds later, coming over and touching my shoulder lightly but surely. "It's good to see you," he said softly.

I managed an awkward grin; and then it was all right again. He sat at the writing desk by the window while I moved around, unpacking my things.

"How long will you be here?" he asked.

I shrugged. "As long as His Highness wants me here. He expects us to find Sai within the next twenty-seven days, so probably not longer than that."

"You're hunting for Sai again?" A little darkness came into his voice. "Why?"

"That's confidential."

"Unusual of you to be so obedient to Touya Akira."

That pulled me up short. "Were you always this good at pushing people's buttons?"

"Yours? Yes, always." The words slid easily from his lips, like they had all evening. His hair was longer than he had worn it when we were novitiates. There were tiny copper studs in his ears.

"You're brilliant at your job, aren't you? No wonder they've kept you here this long."

"It'd be a waste of human resources otherwise. It takes a long time to master the Yihian language."

There was a low stool next to the mahogany armoire where I'd just put away my clothes. I sat there. "Did you talk to Shindou when he came to Yih last year?"

"Yes." His face was cautious; he did not elaborate. I chose my next questions carefully.

"How was he?"

"Polite. Distracted."

"Distracted?" The window by Isumi's head was ajar; the breeze made the magnolia print curtains billow inwards.

"I mostly spoke to Sai," he said.

"Then he was--"

"Not quite. Almost."

"What were they planning?"

"To get rid of the 'not quite'." He stood and paced slowly across the carpet. "To be honest, he seems essentially a kind person. Under different circumstances, we might have been friends."

"If he was alive, you mean? Where did they go after that?"

"Shindou wouldn't tell me."

"Is Shindou angry?"

Isumi studied my face. "He doesn't blame you, if that's what you're asking."

I looked into his eyes. "And you?"

"Only for leaving me."

A year ago, six months ago, the response would have been: "Only for leaving the novitiates." Or perhaps: "Only for giving up on divination." Now Isumi's answer hovered in the air, gentle, naked, forgiving.

I went to the balcony and watched the moon weaving in and out of the clouds. He followed me. I heard the rise and fall of his breath.

"I won't move to Wuzi." I stared at the rickshaws wheeling in the streets below.

"I thought you mightn't."

"I don't even know why. It's just—"

"You want to take responsibility. Even though you did the right thing."

"I happen to think Shindou was correct! What's the point of predicting the future if you can't control it?" I spun around and he caught me by the shoulders.

"It's a long way from divination to necromancy," he murmured, stroking my wrist with his thumb. Belatedly, I realised that I was trembling.

"Let go of me," I said finally.

He withdrew, and left the room as gracefully as he had entered. Gripping the balustrade tightly, I scowled into the darkness.

#

The first thing Yang Hai did when he arrived at supper was to ruffle Le Ping's hair, prompting a yelp from the brat. Then he shook my hand.

"So you're Waya. I feel like we know each other already. Isumi talks about you all the time."

"All unflattering, I'm sure." He was tall, with a sun-darkened complexion, blunt features, and sleepy but shrewd eyes. His mandarin robe was of ultramarine satin, embroidered in thread the colour of robin's eggs.

I was placed between Le Ping and Touya at the dining table after Yang Hai professed a desire to see 'the twins' side by side.

The meal was exquisite, which was just as well. Halfway through our entree of quail's eggs and crisp noodles tossed in sesame oil, Yang Hai changed tack, picking on Touya instead:

"So you're the little princeling of Ki. You're prettier than I expected.'

It wasn't the sort of jibe that could be expected to perturb Touya, who merely finished chewing, and glanced back with his straight inexorable gaze. He _was_ pretty; beautiful, in fact. "It's a privilege to meet you as well. The news of your exploits in the Yihian Ministry of Internal Affairs has preceded you."

"Would you like some wine?" Isumi deftly decanted the clear liquid into my glass without waiting for my response.

"I met your father not long ago," Yang Hai told Touya. "He's an impressive man."

"Yes, I know. I grew up with him."

Le Ping asked for seconds. Isumi told him to wait for the main course. Le Ping eyed Touya's barely disarrayed appetiser in dismay. Touya was a small eater, and a slow one.

"I asked him why he had come to Yih," said Yang Hai. "He said he was searching for a person."

"Did he tell you who he was seeking?"

"If I'd needed him to tell me, I wouldn't deserve my job." Above us, the miniature chandelier flickered. Le Ping fiddled with the silverware. I debated whether I was too old to kick Isumi under the table, decided that I was, and settled for gritting my teeth at the portrait in the far corner, a monochromic woodcut of a young boy playing a _biwa_ by a miniature stream.

Touya had stopped all pretense of eating. "Do you have something to tell me, Privy Minister? If not, I suggest that we cease trading meaningless words."

"If you wish." Yang Hai placed a quail's egg between his lips and swallowed it whole. "But I rather think you're the one who has questions for me. If you want me to answer them, you should start by asking."

Touya flushed. He took a delicate sip of white wine. His skin was fair and dry, his eyes glistening with provoked temper. I watched his pride duke it out with his curiosity and lose. He finally mustered a query while the main course (tea-marinated duck, steamed cabbage, arranged on black rice) was being served. "Where did my father go?"

"I don't know." Irritation flickered in Touya's eyes at Yang Hai's response; I wondered what _would_ happen if a Ki State Diviner murdered a Yihian Minister.

"He did mention one thing before he left: that he was looking for the center of heaven. Does that mean anything to you?"

_You have to assert control over the universe, if you want to suborn it. _

Touya, too, caught the significance, judging by the tiny but visible contraction of his jaw.

Yang Hai said, "I would like to clear Lu Li of the charges being laid against him. Two men thousands of miles apart, both killed in empty rooms. That's not a mystery I know how to solve. Is Touya Akira capable of deciphering the heart of the puzzle?"

I set down my chopsticks with a clack against the enamel rice bowl. "Touya's not the only person in Ki interested in getting to the bottom of this, you know."

Yang Hai snapped his fingers. "Ah, yes, I forgot that you were the hero of the Sai tribunal."

It was then that I realised that Touya was not the only one he was trying to provoke.

#

Isumi apologised in the morning. "Yang Hai can be unorthodox, but he's a good person at heart."

"He's a prat," I snapped. Le Ping voiced assent.

"He's on our side."

"Aren't you being a little premature in assuming that we're on the same side?" In the gray matutinal light, the interior of the consulate appeared shadowy and riotous with ornaments: jade monkeys, chryselephantine figurines. Cursive calligraphy in watery ink covered human-sized sheets of rice paper, muttering wisdom, longevity, and riches to the inhabitants of the building. Isumi stood out in stark sober contrast, dressed in taupe trousers, a pressed cotton shirt, and a moire tie.

"Then why are you here?" Isumi was hurt, now. I was too consumed with immediate and intermediate goals to consider his feelings. I needed to _think_.

"Where's Touya?" I asked.

From the little flicker of Isumi's eyelids, I knew that he would have preferred to segue into frank argument. But we were both dismayingly aware of Le Ping's presence. "I think he's in the reading room. He told the servants he wouldn't be coming in for breakfast."

"I'm going to talk to him." I scooped up the last of my congee in two efficient, impolite mouthfuls and kicked my chair back, determinedly not looking at anyone else. Isumi's sad, _understanding_ gaze raked my back.

I found Touya sitting on a sheepskin rug in a corner of the library, slouched over a dusty leatherbound tome and surrounded by towers of many more books. Dust hung in the air; I sneezed.

Noticing my presence, he wished me a good morning. His manners had at least improved that much since we were novitiates.

"Let me guess." I started flipping through the volumes he'd collected. "You're questing for the center of heaven."

"Do you know anything you're not sharing with me?" His defensiveness was palpable today. Note to self: Touya Akira did have weak points. "I suppose not."

I joined him on the rug, half-expecting him to shrink back. He did not. The book he was reading was a history of geomancy. "_The Directions of Chaos and Order in Land and Air_. Do you expect the _tengen_ to be a physical location?"

"I'm not sure. But it wouldn't do us much good if it were merely a theoretical concept."

"Well, we could always ask around, see if anyone else has a more concrete lead on where your father went off to." I didn't voice my worry: that three months was a long time. Both Shindou and Touya Kouyou could be anywhere in the world by now.

"The _tengen_ opening--"

"Wasn't a Sai thing at all. It was something Shindou always did. But none of Sai's divinations ever began at that point. Not even the _last_ one, where, you know – yeah."

"It may mean that Shindou is a more powerful Diviner than Sai is, by now."

Dawn birdsong drifted indoors, a concatenation of caws, trills, and twittering. I laughed. "So much for your constant dismissal of Shindou when we were novitiates. I'm going to get dressed. Don't stay here too long, we need to get out and do some detecting by midmorning."

"We?"

"I can't speak Yihian, remember? So if you want me to do any investigating, you're going to have to interpret for me. Oh, and don't forget to pull up some necromantic texts while you're still there."

"I know what to do," he said, prickly.

I felt irrationally delighted as I exited.


	6. Chapter 6

_**Author's Note:** Just wanted to drop a note of thanks to the reviewers of this fic – and in particular Kaiko Aozora and Shizuka Sen – to let you know that you are awesome. Much love, Lynn. 3 _

Le Ping drew me a map of the imperial palace, saying, "You'd get lost if I didn't."

"Given the quality of your art? Getting lost is still a very real possibility." I squinted at the diagram. It was composed of three expansive courtyards, each labelled in Le Ping's chicken scrawl: Phoenix, Lion, Dragon.

"This is where the Ministry of Internal Affairs is based." He pointed to a lopsided rectangle in the northeast corner of the Lion Court. His finger then moved to a wonky circle nearby. "And this is the Pagoda of the Nine Stars. That's where they found Shi Zhen."

"Right under Yang Hai's nose, hmm? No wonder he's being such a jerk about it."

"It's not funny, it's a real headache. Lu Li was the chief of the Imperial Diviners, and Shi Zhen was his deputy." A glint of embarrassment came into his eyes. "I'm actually the third-ranked Imperial Diviner."

I burst out guffawing. "So you're the acting chief of the Imperial Diviners? No wonder everyone wants to resolve this case quickly, before the palace grinds to a halt."

"Shut up! I didn't know what to do. Yang Hai took over for me, that's how I could come to Ki to see you."

"They were that eager to get rid of you, huh?" Belatedly I realised that I'd hurt his feelings. I fumbled for a way to mend my words. "You're awfully young to be ranked third, though."

He brightened immediately. Ah, the resilience of youth. "I was the youngest in a century to get into the upper echelons of the Imperial Diviners. Actually, Zhao Shi would have beaten me to it, but being Emperor and all, he gets a special rank."

"So the Emperor was trained as a diviner as well? Does he dislike Lu Li or something?"

"Zhao Shi believes in Lu Li's innocence." I raised my head and saw Isumi emerging from the Consulate building. He crossed the tiny, slate-coloured bridge that connected the main garden to the gazebo where Le Ping and I were seated, coming to a halt about a yard away from us. His eyes were fresh. Sunlight danced on his hair.

Isumi continued: "But there's not much he can do without compromising his position. The Minister of the Left has been criticising the excessive power of the Imperial Diviners for the last several years. And most of the Cabinet supports him. There's no way Zhao Shi can acquit Lu Li without sufficient proof."

I snorted. "And in the end, it all comes down to politics. Nothing new under the sun. Do we at least have an autopsy report?"

"Spontaneous necrosis of multiple organs, including the cerebrum and the myocardium. Cause unknown. Basically, the tissue in his body just began dying, for no apparent reason – his heart, his lungs, his brain. I've been doing research while Le Ping was in Ki, and I can't find a single poison that would cause something like that. Neither can the palace doctors."

I felt ill. "And on the outside? His skin?"

"Burn marks from the stones, just like the ones on Ouza-_sensei_. Nothing else."

"Change your approach to research. Start looking in the compendia of medical divination. Focus particularly on the physiological effects of chaos within the body. Well, Touya might already have caught on to that line of thought, so check with him first."

"You and Touya seem to have your own theories about the death," said Isumi. "Care to share them with me?"

"Come on, Isumi," I scoffed. "You'd never have asked me to come if you weren't harbouring suspicions."

Swallows swooped overhead; bees nestled in the camellia bushes. Through the fretted iron gates that separated the Consulate from the outside world, I saw palanquins and automobiles travelling side-by-side on the road

At last Isumi bowed his head. "I called you because I think Wang Shi Zhen may have been murdered by divination."

"And I agree," I said.

#

The question was who, and how. Touya, however, had no doubts on that score.

"It was Shindou," he said. "The whole thing smells of his Weiqi. Both in the Room of Profound Darkness, and the divination that Le Ping showed me."

"That's kind of a really huge leap of logic to make," Le Ping commented. His reaction was the mildest. Isumi looked palely aghast.

"Isn't it a little premature to be naming names, Touya? We don't even understand yet, how divination could be used to kill. Our first step should be to establish the method, not the culprit."

We stood gathered in the front hall of the consulate. We'd been about to leave for the palace when Touya had thrown his hand-grenade of an opinion into our midst.

"I've studied Shindou's divinations constantly for the last two years. Nobody understands his methods better than I do."

"Which is why you hadn't changed the future successfully even _once_ until I showed you how?" Le Ping raised a brow.

"I'd never tried," Touya snapped. "It's illegal in Ki."

Le Ping lifted his chin. "Didn't take you for a coward."

My attention was all on the dawning realisation in Isumi's face. So far I'd taken care not to mention what had happened on the train, but it looked like that effort was moot now.

Isumi shot me a _You'd better explain this later expression_. I cleared my throat loudly. "Why are you so sure that it's Shindou, and not Sai?"

"Sai wouldn't kill."

"And you think Shindou would?"

Touya ignored me and began heading for the door.

"Answer me!" I reached forward and grabbed his sleeve.

"Waya."

Ignoring Isumi,'s soft reproach, I hauled Touya back until he was facing me "You've always had this ridiculous complex about Shindou, and now you're accusing him of murder? Ignoring the fact that it was your high-and-mighty father who banished him in the first place--"

Touya struck me.

Surprised, I let him go. My cheek stung; I laughed. "You hit like a girl."

But Touya had already turned away. He left in a whirl of his crimson robes, and I realised that Le Ping was going to have to be my language interpreter for the day.

#

"Politically, Touya's hypothesis would be the most favourable for us, if it were correct," said Isumi, as we walked towards the palace. "Proving that divination was responsible for Shi Zhen's death wouldn't help Lu Li's case, and it might hurt."

"Who else had access to the scene of the crime?" I was still unwilling to implicate Shindou. "Before the the crime happened, I mean. It would help if we could prolong the case, throw out a red herring or two for the judge."

Li Ping answered: "Lu Li. Shi Zhen. Any current and former Imperial Diviners of lotus rank and above – that's about ten people in total, including me. One or two servants. But everyone else has solid alibis."

"Who found the body?"

"The Emperor," answered Isumi. We passed through a long promenade paved in hexagonal stone and flanked by rows of weeping willows. "The other problem is that Shi Zhen and Lu Li had a history of - let's say, not getting along. Somewhat like Waya and Touya."

"If you bring up that bastard's name again, I'll..." I trailed off when it occurred to me that Touya was the bastard who was _paying_ me, and paying generously. That nullified quite a lot of heartache and inconvenience.

"It's something of a backhanded compliment that he's hiring you to hunt for Sai, isn't it?" Isumi sounded amused, so help me. "No small compliment, either, considering that it's Touya."

"Who said I wanted compliments from Touya?"

"And he didn't terminate your employment either, even after that little altercation."

"No chance of that. It's not his style."

"Looks like you've got your dream job, then. Good money _and_ the chance to mouth off at Touya Akira."

"You've gotten really good at being sarcastic. It's a lousy trait."

Le Ping cleared his throat. "No offense, but it's really boring listening to you guys. I'm going to speed up, so see you when you get there."

He sauntered on ahead, leaving behind an uncomfortable silence.

Eventually I grinned at Isumi. "I suppose he has a point. Pax?"

Isumi clasped my proffered hand, his relief palpable. "I apologise if I've come across as unfriendly. It's just – you're so _different_."

"_I'm_ so different? You're one to talk. You should tape record your conversations and listen to yourself. You've obviously been taking lessons from Yang Hai."

For a while he made no response, and I peered at him anxiously as we ambled along. Then he shook his head. "Yang Hai is... very good at comporting himself. I envied that a great deal when I was sent here to Yih."

"You were fine the way you were," I told him.

"So were you."

"No, I wasn't." We exchanged glances, keeping our faces cheerful, Inside, I was aware of a tiny piece of my heart breaking, although I couldn't pinpoint where or why.

Isumi released my fingers. "I suppose we've both grown up."

"I don't think I like growing up."

"Le Ping would concur with you, there."

"He's a sensible kid," and, because I _had_ to change the subject for my own peace of mind, "so, tell me about Lu Li's so-called motive for murder, and why it didn't convince you."

We rounded the corner and paused to avoid a trishaw that was wheeling past, carrying two women wearing jade bangles and heavy maquillage. Isumi checked his watch. I eyed the clock face out of the corner of my vision: five past eleven.

"Wang Shi Zhen was known to be extremely ambitious. But he was fairly young for his position, and so was Lu Li. There was little chance of either of them being promoted for a while."

"So Wang saw Lu Li as an impediment to his rise? Doesn't sound like adequate motivation for Lu to bump _him_ off, though."

"As I mentioned earlier, they also had personality issues. They came to blows about two weeks ago. In the presence of the Dukian ambassador, too; he's one of the witnesses for the trial, which is embarrassing for the Empire, to say the least."

"Rather odd that they're asking a foreigner to testify." The Yihian Empire had grown less insular in the last few decades, but it was still a pretty conservative country.

"I heard he volunteered. It happened late at night, after they'd been out drinking, so there weren't many others around anyway. The Dukian embassy's pretty close to the winehouse district."

"So he's the one who stepped forward? Strangely generous of him. I think I'd like to have a chat with this ambassadorial fellow."

"Sounds like a plan. He's usually at the palace at this time of the day. Do you speak Dukian?"

"Not a word. But what kind of ambassador would he be if he didn't speak _Kigo_?"

#

Isumi didn't cross-examine me about what Touya and Le Ping had been doing in the way of forbidden divination, which I took to mean that he was saving the topic for an opportune moment, leaving me to mull nervously in the meantime. Fortunately I was too distracted to worry much about anything beyond the immediate moment. Le Ping was nowhere to be seen by the time we reached the palace, and Isumi had a meeting with the Department of Foreign Affairs, leaving me to wander up and down the Phoenix Court, practising sign language, smiling, and generally looking helpless at anyone who made the mistake of greeting me. I walked several hundred yards to the northern gate that led to the Lion Court, only to find it guarded heavily, as were most of the eye-catching buildings in this compound. I'd half-expected to be questioned and thrown out any moment, but the general expectation seemed to be that if you'd made it past the main entranceway, you had business being here.

Eventually I made my way back to the austere, gabled outbuilding that Isumi had disappeared into for his appointment, and sat by a nearby pond. It was raised, with a mossy artificial fountain and half a dozen glittering carp circling somnolently within. Water striders sent out minuscule ripples as they rowed back and forth between the lotus leaves.

I was squatting at the edge, lightly splashing the pond surface in an attempt to terrorise the carp, when Touya found me.

"I've been searching for you," he said, out of nowhere. The shock of his voice sent me toppling - backwards, fortunately, instead of forward into the water.

I landed on my tail-bone. Hard.

The noon sun was high in the sky. I blinked upwards until the figure of Touya, regarding me seriously, came into focus.

"I'm sorry for hitting you," he said.

He helped me to my feet. I checked to make sure that the world hadn't ended; it hadn't.

"My bum _really hurts_," I complained out loud.

Touya's eyebrow twitched, a gesture I interpreted as, _Don't make me apologise twice in a row, you fool._.

I sighed. "Forgiveness tendered, and requested. I was a bit of a prat back there as well."

"I have a few hours before my scheduled audience with the Emperor, if you need to question some of the people in the palace."

I was starting to get used to Touya's relentlessly focused mind. "You're free to act as interpreter? How are you with Dukian?"

If he was startled, he didn't show it. "Competent. I speak it about as well as I speak Yihian."

"There's a Dukian ambassador involved in the Lu Li case whom I want to speak to. Name of--" I ransacked my memory. Isumi had mentioned it to me, but the unfamiliar syllables had vanished from my thoughts within moments.

"An Taeseon."

"That's it – how did you know?"

"It was in the local newspapers. Which I read this morning." He didn't need to add the _unlike you_.

"Oh," I said. This lack of linguistic know-how was _really _getting to me.

#

An Taeseon was a clean-shaven, dapper man in his late twenties. His suit was finely tailored: pinstripe trousers, watered silk tie. His manners were better than his clothes. He spoke _Kigo_ with no traces of an accent.

"Have a seat," he said, motioning towards the handcarved chesterfields in the Dukian embassy's main meeting room (in the end we'd gone there to find him). He sat down in a lavishly upholstered brocade armchair opposite us. "It's an unexpected pleasure to meet both of you. I take it that this is an informal visit?"

Touya looked at me. I said: "We wanted to ask you about the Lu Li case. I understand that you were there when a brawl broke up between him and Wang Shi Zhen,"

"Shocking event, that one. The murder, that is. As for the fistfight – well, they're young." He shrugged gracefully. "I used to supervise the royal novitiates when I was still living back home. Boys will be boys. Would you like coffee or tea?"

Touya requested tea. I opted for coffee, and continued, "Do you think Lu Li was capable of murdering his deputy?"

"I can hardly comment on that, not being well acquainted with them. From the state they were in at the winehouse that night, yes, I think they would have at least seriously injured each other, if the onlookers hadn't pulled them apart."

I observed his face, looking for signs of dissimulation, but his delivery and expression were pitch perfect. Too perfect. "Did you know what precipitated the fight?"

Taeseon crossed and uncrossed his legs. "I'm afraid I was sitting too far away to overhear their conversation. By the time I noticed anything they were both rolling on the floor together. The bigger one – Wang Shi Zhen – was punching the Chief Diviner's face. They broke some glasses and chairs, and the onlookers separated them before could do any more damage. The Chief Diviner was still cursing Shi Zhen as he was carried out of the building. I won't insult you by repeating his language here. May I enquire why you're interested in this matter?"

"Curiosity, I suppose. I suppose you've heard about Zama-Ouza's death?"

His eyes flickered. "Yes. My condolences."

"Extraordinarily similar circumstances of death."

"I have heard it so remarked, yes."

"We're hoping that by uncovering the the facts of Wang Shi Zhen's death, we might be able to cast light on our own tragedy."

"That seems logical enough to me. I wish you all the best in your endeavour; however, I've told you all I know. I deeply regret that I will not be able to be of more help." My further attempts at questioning him yielded only opaque and unsatisfying answers. When we had been there about forty minutes he stood up. "Excuse my rudeness; I have an appointment with a colleague for lunch. Feel free to stay and finish the drinks and refreshments. I hope to have the privilege of meeting you again sometime soon."

He bowed; we bowed; he left.

"He's lying," I said, once the room was empty. Touya frowned at me. "Okay, maybe not _lying_, but he's keeping something back. Such as, say, his reasons for being involved in this trial."

"And how do you know that?"

"Intuition. The same kind of intuition that tells you Shindou did it, I suppose."

Awkardness came and passed; we were still not ready to talk about Shindou.

I drained my coffee. "I'm going to find out what he's hiding."


	7. Chapter 7

After three days of shadowing An Taeseon, I was seriously starting to question the quality of my hunches. Or possibly my ability to tail someone.

"Any contacts that we can identify?" I demanded of Touya. It was my umpteenth time asking; and our seventh time or so skulking in a teahouse pretending to drink brewed chrysanthemums. The last six occasions, An had been having lunch or tea or supper or breakfast with one dignitary or another. Today, he was shopping.

I examined the horizontal signboard that hung above the store An had just disappeared into. As far as I could tell from the engraved characters, it was a vendor of foodstuffs, specialising in Dukian delicacies.

"Isn't this the kind of thing one sends the servants out to do?" I grumbled to the air.

"Never having had servants, you wouldn't know, would you?" replied Touya. "And not that I think you need reminding, but Isumi and I have finished the background checks on all of Ambassador An's associates as well as everyone he's met since we started this investigation. None of them are known to have adverse relationships with Lu Li. In fact, most of them are former Imperial Diviners and are eager to defend him."

Touya's patience was wearing thin at last. I was surprised that he'd entertained my suspicions for this long. "Okay, maybe it's time to give up."

He didn't answer. It was a warm, wet day, and I felt too lazy to take any immediate action. We kept our eyes on the shopfront, waiting for Taeseon to emerge. Touya gathered his teacup in his fingers and brought it to his lips. He blew gently on the fragrant liquid; it was steaming delicately. "I have a private meeting with the Emperor tomorrow. He asked me to invite you as well."

"Oh. Right." My curiosity brimmed over on several counts – what could Zhao Shi want with me? How had he even _heard_ of me? They weren't exactly subtle questions, though; not the sort of topic one raised with Touya Akira when he was being tetchy. I resumed staring out the window. Touya brought out his Weiqi board and began reenacting divination patterns for it.

"No coins," I warned him.

"Am I the one who's been exhibiting subhuman levels of logic? I propose that you refrain from giving me advice." He set a white stone down with a hard rap.

The sky was dull; the street had begun to darken with small dark circles, and the pedestrians were scurrying for shelter. "You could try altering the weather. Lovely chaos-order experiment right there. Practical, too. I didn't bring a raincoat, did you?"

"He's coming out," Touya said, and indeed An Taeseon was leaving the store. _He_ was well-prepared; his roomy black umbrella bloomed out before he took a single step onto the sidewalk.

"Let's get moving." I tasted my tea and gave it up as a lost cause. I had left it too long, and it was bitter.

We paid and scrambled downstairs. The wind blew rain in our faces as we stepped out; water entered my eyes. I scrunched them up and tried to blink the moisture away.

When I could see again, I did a double take. A familiar figure was standing in the entranceway of the comestible shop.

Hong Suyeong.

#

I ran forward and caught him by the hand.

His first, instinctive action was to shake me off. He'd always been combative that way.

"Suyeong!"

He recognized me and stilled. "Waya? What are you doing here--" He pulled me into the store. Touya followed. Inside, a woody, herbal scent pervaded the area. The wind blew in irregularly, spattering the fading, inch-sized tiles with rain.

Unsurprisingly, Suyeong was taller now. I hazarded that he was close to six feet these days. The trademark cap had disappeared; he was dressed to the nines. Cross-collar shirt, stitched in sashiko; a tasselled grey sash; silk breeches, disappearing into ash-coloured boots. He retained the conscientious and perpetually harassed air that I'd always associated with him. He was hauling a large suitcase.

It took him some time to adjust to the sudden turn of events. He greeted me, then Touya. It transpired that he knew the shopkeeper, and we were ushered into a back room where we could catch up quietly.

"Were you meeting An Taeseon?" I asked, launching a preemptive strike.

It landed. "You know Taeseon?"

"Oh, we've chatted once or twice. Happened to see him come out of the shop, just before I spotted you. Are you friends?"

"He was in charge of the novitiates when I was still in training." Suyeong's hands were stained with ink. "I heard that you refused to join the State Diviners."

"Yeah, well. Ideological differences with the state. I was kind of pissed off that they sent Shindou away."

"So was I." Touya had this way of dropping his words, simultaneously casual and too formal, exact without being stilted, that made you feel like his anything he said was desperately important. It was that manner of his, as much as the content of his words, that drew people's attention.

"It was your loss," Suyeong said shortly. I recalled how he'd been crazy about Shindou's divination skills – all of us had been, in those final months. The slow unease, the stupefaction, and then the insecurity, when we realised he was beginning to eclipse us.

"Have you met him since he left Ki?"

"No." Spoken rapidly, eye contact delayed and brief. My heart sank.

"Bad move," I remarked. "You should have said 'Yes, of course, but he left months ago.'"

"I'm not lying," Suyeong said. He was, I noted, awfully poor at dissimulation. His eyes were even darting back and forth.

"Where is he?"

"I don't know!" Suyeong turned his head, hunting for ports of escape. I moved, deliberately and slowly, to block the exit. Touya placed himself in front of Suyeong. Suyeong was about an inch taller, but seemed the smaller and weaker of the two. When he saw Touya a distinct guilty flush came into his cheeks.

"When Zama-Ouza's body was found, there was a Ladder of Changes on his board, connected to a Star of Chaos. At Diviner Wang's death there was a Shattered Wall enclosing a Flower of Chains. I've never known anyone who loves those two patterns as much as Shindou did." Touya locked gazes with Suyeong. "Two people have died. Do you intend to let this continue?"

Suyeong turned away.

"Can we talk in private?" he asked.

#

We brought him to the consulate. Isumi was at home, and greeted Suyeong with effusive enthusiasm (almost deceptive, I thought -- it took Isumi only a glance to see that something was wrong.) I watched Suyeong to make sure he didn't indulge in any more mendacity, or attempt to make excuses; but he emanated a strange, overt sense of relief.

We gathered in a sitting room and he told us his story.

#

_Shindou came to Duk this spring, about three months ago. We'd heard a lot about him and Sai, as you can imagine – most of it was baseless gossip, but a few people in the royal court were aware of the true story. The king even had to pass a law banning forbidden divination, because of the mad tales that people were concocting about Sai. Two years ago there were many diviners trying to use Weiqi to control chaos and order, but nobody succeeded, so the scandal gradually died down._

Anyway, I'd kept up with the news about Shindou as best as I could. Around the time he appeared in my country, a rumour was floating around that Sai had succeeded in re-embodying himself. But when Shindou knocked on my door that evening, he was alone.

He didn't look well either. He was thin, almost emaciated, and his hair was dull. He asked me if he could stay for a few days. I was more than happy to host him. But it soon became clear that Shindou wasn't his old self – he didn't speak unless he was spoken to, he didn't come out of his room even for meals, except when I asked him to. After about a week of this, I was going out of my mind.

_Then Ko Yeongha found out. You may have heard of Yeongha - he's one of the highest-ranked Royal Diviners, and a close friend of mine. I'd often talked to him about Shindou, and how impressed I was with Shindou's divination abilities when I visited Ki._

He insisted on meeting Shindou. I didn't want to let him, at first – Yeongha likes to be provocative, and Shindou didn't seem to be in any shape for it. But Yeongha can be terribly persistent. He secretly went to my house when I was at work. When I got home, he and Shindou were screaming at each other. I was furious at Yeongha after that. The next day, however, Shindou said he wanted to see Yeongha again.

I don't know how he managed it, but Yeongha persuaded Shindou to tell him the entire tale of how he ended up in Duk. The rumours were true: Sai had found a way to recreate his human body using divination, with Shindou's help. But that wasn't the end of it. Soon after, Touya Meijin came hunting for them. 

#

Suyeong paused. "We found out that Touya Meijin had sealed Sai away at the expense of his own life."

Heart hammering, I looked at Touya, who remained expressionless.

He said: "Continue. You haven't told us how Shindou killed those two men."

Suyeong reached into a pocket in his shirt and pulled out a worn piece of paper, folded many times. "You've heard how, in ancient times, the diviners used geomancy to create their Weiqi boards?"

He went to a grand piano that stood next to our chairs, and spread the sheet out on its closed lid, revealing a map of the continent. Black crosses and circles lay scattered on the landmass, surrounded by copious annotations.

Suyeong pointed to the city of Ki, underlined by the characters that said Shrine of Profound Darkness, and to Wuzi. "I have been hunting the nine flower-points – you would call them the star-points. To be precise, I'm looking for the origin of heaven, the _tengen_."

"That's where Shindou is?" I asked. Suyeong nodded. A rapid stream of puzzles clicked and fired through my mind. "He's trying to resurrect Sai, isn't he? That's the first thing he _would_ do." The boy who had left Ki, given up his entire family and homeland, rather than allowing the the authorities to exorcise the ghost embedded in his soul-- I stood and began to pace. "And the deaths were – the result of the chaos-order backlash? An attempt to manipulate the border between the living and the dead?"

"Yes," said Suyeong.

Touya didn't seem surprised. I wondered whether he'd been expecting something of the sort, or whether the news of his father's death had dulled out most other reactions. Probably a bit of both.

Isumi studied the ink-smudged map. "Using the land itself as a _goban_, controlled by wielding a board at the site of origin – it's possible. But you would have to find three hundred and sixty one points that were suitable. And the _hoshi_ in particular would require very specific properties.

"Properties that places like the Shrine of Profound Darkness would possess." My voice sounded grim to myself.

A luminous, eldritch moon, shining through the oculus in the Council House, casting swarthy foreshortened shadows on the glassy marble. The door to the Shrine ajar. Noise like storm rain on ceramic tiles, heard from indoors -- a cacophony of stones, dancing on the Shrine's nine boards like waves on a windwracked sea. And Shindou kneeling at the heart of it all, hand outstretched in midair and poised to fall on the grid, superimposed with a translucent fluttering outline of fingers, a wide sleeve, wild alluring hair, burning eyes, occupying the same space as Shindou and yet _beyond_ –

That had been my last night as a novitiate.

"Shindou left in the middle of the night," Suyeong continued. "By the time I realised he was gone, the trail was cold. Even after that, it took me some time to guess his plans."

"And how does An Taeseon fit into all this?" asked Isumi sharply. "Why is he casting suspicion on Lu Li?"

Suyeong seemed more than a little afraid of Isumi. Oddly, I didn't blame him. "Yeongha is with Shindou. We didn't want anyone else to find out."

The rain had stopped. The awning windows, still shut, were decorated with stationary and slowly trickling drops. Through the glass I saw a hint of rainbow in the clouds.

Isumi spoke, more to himself than to any of us: "Ko Yeongha, the most celebrated young diviner in Duk. In other words, he's the Touya Akira of your nation. Of course Taeseon would want to protect him. And you were prepared for the execution of an innocent man in order to save your country's reputation?"

"I didn't mean--"

"Of course you didn't mean to. That's the excuse of all the people who'd like to believe they are good." By now Isumi had all of us mesmerised, even Touya. He had the kind of voice that seemed soft-spoken, but in fact held both volume and fluency. "The honourable thing would be to meet with the Emperor and tell him everything that you know."

"Isumi." I didn't think it wise to push Suyeong too quickly, too soon.

"It's all right," Suyeong said quietly. "I will go. But the two of you, Waya, Touya, you must promise me that you will find Shindou. You know him better than I do, don't you?"

Touya and I looked at each other. I was surprised by the fierce agreement I saw in his eyes, and the corresponding emotion that surged inside me.

"We will," said Touya.

#

Touya and I obtained maps from a nearby street vendor and retired to the library to copy Suyeong's notes. He'd identified nearly eighty locations as potential _hoshi_ points, some of them thousands of miles away.

"A death in Ki, a death in Wuzi, nine days apart. An earthquake at the Hill of Flowers in Duk, nine days before that." Touya used a midnight blue fountain pen with a golden nib. He sat at the bay window, silhouetted against an approaching sunset. "The original attempt to re-embody Sai required nine separate divinations."

"Yes, that's how I caught him. He sneaked out once too often." I was lying belly-down on a rug, pored over my map. "Could we cast a divination on the maps themselves, to narrow down the likely location of the _tengen_?" We had agreed fairly quickly with Suyeong's hypothesis that the geomantic origin of heaven was the only place that Shindou - and Yeongha - could be.

"I don't know. More and more of my divinations are failing at the moment, perhaps because of how close we are to a _hoshi_ point."

"Whatever Shindou is doing over there, it's disturbing the chaos-order alignment of the continent." I gave voice to a thought that was bothering me. "Do you think he knows about the deaths he's caused? Do you think he caused them _intentionally_?" The notion of using divination principles to bring back a dead person was so foreign that I only had a very hazy notion of how it could be done. But it _was_ theoretically possible that one needed to sacrifice lives in order to perform a resurrection.

"I don't know."

"Your father--"

"Won't be coming back. Concentrate on what we can do."

"What if Suyeong was lying about part of his story?"

"You'd have noticed, wouldn't you?"

He raised his head just slightly, and I saw how proud and stiff his posture was, and how brittle his hands, pallid despite the outrageous gold tint of the sun sinking at his back. If I cast a rock at him he would break; if I got up and put my arms around him, he might collapse--

And if I brought him a _goban_, he would pull himself together. So that was what I did.

We sat at the window, the kaya grid lying between us, our attention all for it rather than each other. I placed the first stone.

White to _tengen_.

In the language of traditional divination, this placement signifies the heart of chaos in the circumstance under scrutiny. It is usually followed by a diamond of black stones surrounding it, chaos under the control of order. In Sai's divination, the new divination, the heretical divination – where the aim was not to mirror the existing forces of chaos and order but rather to direct and marshal them – the meaning was different: _I assert the dominance of chaos in the universe._

Ironic that Shindou, who had always astounded us with his clarity of vision, his knack for seeing to the heart of things, would always begin the act of divination with a simple black-or-white judgment.

"What are we divining?" asked Touya. His eyes were dusky with the shadow of sleep deprivation.

I shrugged. "You tell me."

He began laying out a jagged wall on his end of the board while I added eyes to the lower left corner. We didn't speak of what we were doing, although a quick survey of the situation showed that he was doing something in Sai's style – and I, half-consciously, was reconstructing patterns I had seen Shindou use in the past. Within minutes the board was heavy with more than a hundred stones.

"I can't read this at all," I confessed, my eyes tracing the heavy mess of black and white. A set of cross-patterns in the lower right quadrant caught my eye and I frowned. There was something weird and familiar about, it, something – "Hold on." I started scrambling the stones around, inverting and rotating shapes. I removed the stone at _tengen_. "That's odd," I muttered, continuing to make minor changes here and there. "This looks like one of the boards Kuwabara made me do."

"Kuwabara-Honinbou?" Against the darkening vermilion of the sunset Touya appeared subdued, still retaining that strange fragility. I felt as if I was fanning a dying ember; one wrong movement and I would extinguish the glow.

"He sends me these really odd tasks every now and then. This one, for instance - _'Predict the weather at midnight in three days. Use the following crane's nest formation in both corners.'_ So I did, and that was how the pattern came out. _'Clear skies, a gibbous moon, chiaroscuro effects for the nocturnal pedestrian.'_" Studying it now, it was striking how much it resembled Shindou and Sai's style of divination.

Touya brought out another three stones: black at tengen, white at cross stars. "_A chiaroscuro hall, a geometry open to the sky, the night that does not wax nor wane. A city, far to the east._"

I examined the board again and my breath caught. We were looking at at a geomantic and geographical description of the Shrine of Profound Darkness.

"Show me everything Kuwabara-sensei asked you to do."

"From memory? There have to be at least thirty of them!" He gave me a flat look, and I hastily began adjusting stones. "Fine, fine, I'll do it."

Touya had some grid paper with him, which he used to make records, while I struggled to recollect each individual task. After the twenty-first board, he announced that we were done. He had picked out nine divinations and made subtle alterations to each of them, so that each described a location rather than the original message.

Three of these were recognisable as the places we'd already identified as star points, which meant that the _tengen_ was among the remaining six.

I clicked my tongue in frustration. "That old man—so he was hunting Shindou all along? Why can't he ever be straightforward about anything?"

"He's Kuwabara-sensei." Touya's tone was almost fond (or rather would have been, if it hadn't still been _Touya_ speaking.) "It simplifies our task, though."

"Let's narrow down the geographical possibilities for the _tengen_ point. Where was your father when you last lost track of him?" I glanced cautiously at his features, but the delicate, vulnerable composure he was displaying did not give way.

"Shortly after he visited Wuzi. A week before the equinox. He was headed to the south coast, but it doesn't sound as if he made it there."

"And Shindou appeared in Duk," I consulted Suyeong's notes, "fifteen days later. Considering the terrain and the available transport systems that still leaves us with a couple hundred thousand square miles to canvas." Geography was something I _did_ know quite a bit about, fortunately (I'd grown up in the country, right at the very edge of Ki's sovereignty), so I fixed Suyeong's map by excluding all the places that were simply too far from the likely area to be _hoshi_ points, as well as drawing asterisks on the ones that were possible but unlikely.

Touya continued to write down interpretations of the modified boards. "_'The serenity of water falling north. A glade of rocks.'_ That might be the Monastery of the Waterfalls in the Fengwei Mountains. _'An ancient stone. The inscriptions of order, west of the holy mountain.' 'The plain of memorial, the absence of sun.'_ Why would Kuwabara send you these and not someone else?"

"Not sure. Maybe he thought I intended to search for Shindou."

"Why didn't you? Search for him."

"Honestly? Plain old cowardice." I dropped my pen on the carpet and had to crouch down to pick it up. "When he left, it happened so quickly that I couldn't think what to do. By the time I officially resigned from the novitiates, I was busy figuring out what to do now that I no longer had a profession. And looking for Shindou would have been – too hard, I guess."

Touya said softly. "I can relate to that."

Twilight had fallen; we were working in half-darkness. There was a light switch behind Touya and I reached out to flip it on, brushing his shoulder with the underside of my wrist as I did so. "Better late than never. We'll find him. It doesn't matter what he's done, or what he's trying to do."

"We haven't found the _tengen_ yet."

"Ah, that," I smiled down at the map in my hands. "I think I might have some good news about that one."

#

An Taeseon gave the impression of having chewed a basketful of lemons when Touya and I, accompanied by Yang Hai, Isumi and Suyeong, trooped into his office early the next morning.

Isumi took charge immediately. "We'd like you to withdraw your testimony in the trial, in exchange for our cooperation and secrecy in the matter of Shindou Hikaru and Ko Yeongha."

Taeseon rapped his fingers against his desk in a rhythm that sounded thoroughly disgruntled. "Those two children. Far more trouble than they're worth. Well, is there something for me to sign? I do hope you'll at least be more efficient than Suyeong has proved thus far, considering the number of people now involved."

"We 've found the _tengen_," said Touya.

An raised a brow. "Is that so? Rather impressive. My congratulations to you."

"There is something else we wanted to bring up with you," Isumi said, exchanging glances with Yang Hai and Touya. "Something we'd like you to contact your head of state about."

"Oh? I'm all ears."

"With the tentative approval of both the Yihian Emperor and the Oligarchs of Ki, we'd like to set up a trilateral commission to legalise active-control divination -- that is, divination used to control the future."


	8. Chapter 8

"So, Isumi," I said acidly, about five minutes after we'd left the Dukian embassy, "I suppose you were planning to tell me about this sometime in the next year or so?"

We'd left Suyeong behind, to hash out what looked like an uncomfortable and potentially very long conversation with An Taeseon. Yang Hai was coming with us to the palace. Isumi had business with the Records Department there, and Touya and I had a meeting with Yih's teenaged emperor.

Isumi looked embarrassed. "It was quite hard keeping it from you. It was just as well you've been so busy in the last few days. I wanted to tell you the good news sooner, after Le Ping told me what happened on the train, but..." He trailed off.

"But. You enjoyed watching me squirm."

"No, that's--"

"Completely true."

"Who's behind the legalisation proposal?" asked Touya Akira. He seemed only marginally less surprised than I was at this turn of events.

"Ahem. To be honest, that's--"

"Isumi and I have been working on it since he first came to Yih," said Yang Hai. Down the road, a flock of pigeons emerged and scattered from the rafters of a sloped-roof temple. A sunburned man trotted past, hauling an empty rickshaw. A gleaming greenish fly landed on Yang Hai's linen sleeve and he shook it off, sending it towards Touya. "I was Chief Diviner at the time, so I was privy to the classified information that the Oligarchs sent the Emperor. I thought it was a great shame that your government and mine were both rejecting what I perceived to be the natural future of the art. Even if it took a ghost from the past to point us to it."

"The historical records do suggest that active-control divination was known to the ancients, and forbidden even then." The fly alighted on Touya's head and began crawling around. Irritated, Touya flicked at his own hair. "For instance, there is a mention in the _Late Annals of the Go Empire_ of Fujiwara no Sai, stating that he was a practitioner of heresy and was executed by drowning for it."

Yang Hai shrugged. "I don't think that historical precedent is sufficient for us to make a decision blindly. Men should be guided by their reason, don't you think? In any event, soon after I met Isumi, and discovered that he also wanted to legalise so-called heretical divination, although for very different purposes from my own. I'm not sure why, but he seemed to think it would persuade you to rejoin the State Diviners," he said to me.

I was surprised and not a little gratified. "Thank you," I told Isumi, who was – predictably – blushing a faint pink.

"It took us a while, since it was difficult persuading the right people to accept our ideas," Yang Hai told Touya. "The Yihian Empire has a long tradition of being resistant to change. Fortunately Zhao Shi is even more passionate about the subject than we are, and he has been governing the country well since he came to the throne last year. In Ki, on the other hand, you need five of the Oligarchs to consent before negotiations can even begin, and until this week, the Ouza, the Kisei, and both your parents, Touya, were against the Commission."

"My father felt that the time for legalisation was premature." Touya's voice was strained. I automatically felt a surge of both protectiveness for him and hostility to Yang Hai.

"He was a Touya and a Meijin. He acted as someone in his position should have. If we take a shortcut here, we can enter directly into the Phoenix Court, saving ourselves some time." Yang Hai led the way up a flight of stone steps that led through a leafy pergola..

Isumi said, "Kuwabara Honinbou has been helping us for some time now. He and Ogata Juudan telegrammed me yesterday, to say that the Council was willing to open talks for the Comission."

"Who voted in favour?" asked Touya.

Isumi shrugged. "I haven't received that news yet. But there was a note saying that Morishita had been appointed the new Ouza. Probably he and Kurata, then." He smiled at me. "I don't think I'm the only one who hopes you'll return to the Diviners."

I tried to scowl away the lump in my throat. "Your lack of subtlety is almost frightening."

"But effective, I hope?" Isumi placed a hand on my shoulder. I noticed that Touya was watching us, and chose to stare down, at the steep, moss-infiltrated steps we were climbing, at the stumpy penumbric shadows we cast, backlit by the sun.

"Don't hold your breath." I spoke without rancour – and without conviction in the words I said.

#

Touya was about as convinced by my rejection as Isumi was - which was to say, not at all.

"Would you like me to sponsor you into the State Diviners?" he asked, as we travelled through the Phoenix Court. It was more decorative and floral than the outer court, and crammed with buildings and little gardens. We'd left Isumi and Yang Hai back near the Pagoda of Nine Stars, an imposing circular tower that stood a little apart from the surrounding structures.

I raised my brows. "Are you _trying_ to make me angry? Because you know, that's a really good way."

"Really?" He studied my face. "Before you always got angry for no apparent reason."

"That's because--" Amused, I paused. It did make sense that Touya _didn't_ understand why he frustrated people. He was, as far as I could tell, constitutionally incapable of jealousy.

"It's definitely a very good way of making _me_ angry." I nodded firmly. "No more talk about being a State Diviner."

"Okay." A hint of a smile hovered about his lips, and I was pleased. If he couldn't – or wouldn't – talk to me about his father's death, then the only thing I could do was make sure that it wasn't on his mind all the time.

We arrived at the massive gilded pavilion where we were supposed to meet Zhao Shi. It was surrounded by water on four sides, and connected to land by two long walkways. As we came closer I spotted Le Ping, dressed in jeans and a sashed, wide-sleeved shirt. He was sitting on the balustrade at the edge of the pavilion, legs kicking the lake. Drops flew in the air. Sitting behind him on a long inbuilt seat was a boy about Le Ping's age, who had something of the look of a china doll.

"He says you don't need to kneel," Le Ping said, as we drew close. He continued to kick the water. We bowed to Zhao Shi. Touya spoke something in Yihian and Zhao Shi replied. He was the kind of emperor one saw portraits of everywhere, even from street artists whose only glimpse of him was from other paintings. His face retained the soft roundness and delicate skin of a much younger child. His eyes were lustrous.

We sat at a stone table facing Zhao Shi, who said something to Le Ping. Le Ping swivelled around, barely avoiding the emperor with his dripping bare feet, and descended to sit cross-legged on the ground.

"So I'm the translator for today. My Kigo is better than your Yihian, right?" he queried Touya, who admitted that it was so.

Zhao Shi spoke in his soft, musical voice. Le Ping translated: "He wants to say that it's a great pleasure to speak to both of you like this, and he's heard a lot about the two of you, and – hold on. This is getting really long." He turned to Zhao Shi and said something in rapid Yihian. "All right, it's okay, we can cut to business now. He wants to talk about this – heretical divination? What's the right word?"

"Active-control divination," supplied Touya.

"Yeah, that. Anyway, all sorts of problems are going to crop up once it's legal, right? Even more people will want to learn divination than before. And what if more than person wants to change the same future at the same time? It's going to be chaotic." Le Ping looked delighted at the thought. "So Zhao Shi wants to make sure there are limits on active-control divination to begin with."

A brief conversation between Le Ping and Zhao Shi.

"We were worried about the land _goban_, after Isumi told us about it. All those old men in court are going to be freaking over it – a huge Weiqi board, that can affect chaos and order all over the world? So it'd be good if, after we've explained to them how Shi Zhen died" - and here he looked a little sad – "we could announce that the murder weapon had already been destroyed."

I still wasn't convinced it was murder, but that had little bearing on the conversation.

Touya nodded his head. "Understood. In fact that was also on our minds."

"It's the only real way to stop Shindou anyway," I added. "At this stage I'm not sure he'll stop resurrecting Sai just because we asked him nicely. Plus, it wrecks our divinations every time someone uses that board, right?"

Zhao Shi smiled at us and made another little speech, which Le Ping paraphrased (I was under no illusions that he was doing a thorough or even exact translation): "Personally we think it's a pity to destroy such an important magical artefact, but without better international cooperation it would be too controversial to keep it around."

Touya said, "You realise that in destroying the geomantic board we could potentially wreck the physical structures not only of the _tengen_, but also the other _hoshi_ points."

Another exchange between Le Ping and Zhao Shi. "That's something we will have to accept. My understanding is that most of the star-points are within the empire itself. Our messengers will take responsibility for sending warnings to everyone involved, including those outside Yih. And uh." Le Ping darted a sidelong glance at Zhao Shi. "I think that's all."

All of us stood and bowed. "Thanks for entrusting us with this responsibility." Touya said to Zhao Shi. "We plan to leave for the _tengen_ location as soon as possible – this afternoon, in fact. Your help is very much appreciated."

"I want to go with you." Le Ping leaned back on his hands and produced an uncovered yawn.

"Absolutely not," I said. "Suyeong's coming as well, and if three's a crowd, then four's a midsummer parade, complete with elephants in full regalia."

The young emperor leaned down and murmured something in Le Ping's ear. "Zhao Shi says no," Le Ping said, pouting.

"Ah well." I tweaked his hair. He pulled away, glaring at me. "Thanks for all your help, Le Ping."

"I hate you."

"Sure you do." Touya and I bowed again, deeply, to the emperor.

#

The coach journey to the coast lasted several hours, beginning in early afternoon and finishing well after nightfall. Suyeong and I sat together, across the aisle from Touya, It was a cramped little vehicle, crammed with holidaymakers and their noise. There was barely enough foot space between the seats. For a while the road ran alongside the river, and I spent my time observing the opaque, sun-flecked water, the painted riverboats, and the thick reedy vegetation that covered each bank.

When the sky turned to twilight Suyeong unpacked a a hamper he'd brought with him and shared its contents among the three of us – smoked ham sandwiches and rice balls wrapped in bean curd. It wasn't what I'd have packed in my ideal lunchbox, but I was grateful that at least one of us had bothered to think about food. Suyeong possessed the efficient and minimalist organisation of the seasoned traveller. He'd had enough practice in the last couple of months, I supposed.

I wanted to ask him a thousand things about Shindou but couldn't. Not-talking about Shindou had become such a habit by now, I felt like I'd done it all my life. It was hard to believe that it'd only been two years.

The ferry was ready and waiting when we arrived at the port. Its departure had been delayed, we were informed, for our sakes. Isumi had booked us two private cabins; Suyeong took the smaller one. No sooner had we pulled out of the rippling, moon-pathed bay than Touya began to look extremely ill.

"Don't tell me you're one of those people who gets seasick at the drop of a hat," I said, before quickly grabbing the bucket that stood beside the bunks and handing it to him. "You _are_, aren't you?" He was too busy chucking to retort. When he was done he dabbed at his mouth with the handkerchief I lent him (gave him, rather; I didn't want that handkerchief back any time soon).

"You'd better move to Suyeong's cabin." he suggested, sitting down in his bunk and hunching up in an awkward manner that suggested he was trying to minimise all sources of discomfort. I hesitated, reluctant to leave him alone when he was in that condition. He gave me an imperious scowl. "Unless you _enjoy_ watching being sick."

Wishing to spare his pride, I moved my things to Suyeong's room, which I discovered was empty. I went out and found Suyeong standing above deck, leaning against the railing and staring out into a cloudless starry night. The ferry's engines thrummed. Suyeong was dressed plainly for this trip, khaki pants and cambric shirt. He didn't bother acknowledging my presence when I came to stand beside him. We listened to the boat cut its way through the black water.

He asked, "What was Shindou like as a novitiate?"

I closed my eyes and considered all the ways I could respond. In the end the answer came out haltingly, fragmented. "Flaky. Impulsive. Surprising. Vulnerable. You couldn't leave him alone – _I_ couldn't leave him alone, at any rate. And brilliant – but you know that. You saw that when you were in Ki."

We segued into a natural pause, two men bound by a living memory.

"Tell me about Yeongha," I said.

I heard the smile in his voice as he replied: "Impulsive. Suprising. Impossible to ignore. Yeongha is the kind of diviner who looks at an array of stones and sees the colour of tomorrow's sunset, or mildew in the crops, or numbers changing in the stock market. Often he seems more prophet than diviner. But he does it with a _goban_, and only with a _goban_."

The wind blew in his face and he brushed his fringe away from his eyes. "He and Shindou took to each other immediately. I was really jealous at the time."

"Are you still jealous?"

"Yes." The boat changed direction, heading to open sea. "Yes, still jealous."

"I've never been jealous of Shindou. I'm not sure why." I added quietly, "We might have to fight and overpower them, you know."

"I don't mind fighting Yeongha. Shindou – I'm not so sure. He was in really bad condition when he left."

A tired old guilt went through my heart. "Do what you can. Touya and I – we'll do what we must."

Again we sank into a silence that managed to be both comfortable and tension-filled. Eventually Suyeong made his excuses and went back below-deck. I remained a little longer, breathing the salt air; then decided to check on Touya before I retired to bed.

He was no longer retching; although a glance at the bucket and a sniff of the air told me that he'd probably expelled what little food he'd managed to ingest during the day. He lay on his side in his bunk, still dressed in his robes, body scrunched up into a little ball.

"Are you okay?" He was facing the wall and away from me; despite the lack of relevance of the gesture, I touched his forehead to gauge its temperature. His skin was surprisingly cool. He did not speak or react.

With difficulty I coaxed him into turning around and looking up at me. To my horror I saw in his eyes the hard glitter of tears.

"Do you want to talk?" I asked. He shook his head wearily. I wasn't used to this. Isumi, unlike Touya, had a way of letting me know what he needed when he needed it.

Well, one thing was for certain; Touya wouldn't be able to ask for help unless someone was around to hear the request.

"Change of plan. I'm sleeping here tonight." I told him, and went next door to retrieve my belongings. Touya seemed too tired to dispute my decision. He continued to lie there; I decided that persuading him to change into his nightclothes was a lost cause.

I replaced the bucket by his bunk, switched off the lights, and fell asleep once my head touched the pillow. The ferry swayed; I dreamed.

#

_I shouted Shindou's name and he started. The stone slipped from between his fingers. All across the room, black and white pieces fell from the air, landing randomly on the stone grids and spilling across the edges of the boards. They clattered around my feet as I walked closer._

Shindou and the ghost stared at me. They were still, in some sense, the same person, occupying the same area in space and time; the eyes scrutinising me bore Shindou's wide green irises and yet contained more _than that; something darker and wiser and more beautiful and terrifying. Then my fingers closed around Shindou's forearm, and they separated._

The ghost floated upwards, above us, achingly lovely. My nails dug into Shindou's skin.

Shindou's face hardened and, with his free hand, he picked up the white round that he'd just dropped.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Finishing." His hand descended. Nine gobans resumed their chaotic dances.

"What are you doing?"

"Let me go!" Ineffectually he tried to pull away from me. "Waya, you have to let us finish. Tonight. Tonight's the last night. Five minutes. That's all. Please."

I lingered, paralysed in indecision. Around us, the stones roared. The ghost gazed sadly down. And Shindou – Shindou just looked at me.

Finally, I assented. "Understood. I'll leave you alone."

I withdrew my grip, leaving thin crescents of red where my fingers had been. Shindou gave a shaky smile of relief; the ghost bobbed gratefully. I averted my gaze as they melded again, and quietly let myself out of the shrine, walked through the falling moonlight.

I was leaving by way of a corridor when a hand fell on my shoulder.

_It was Ogata Juudan._


	9. Chapter 9

The ferry docked at midmorning. By then Touya was genuinely unwell and dehydrated; Suyeong and I decided that it would be wise to check into a motel until he felt better.

"Mind you," I commented as we dragged our luggage upstairs, "I asked around and we'll have to take a dinghy out to the ruined city anyway, and Touya'll probably start throwing up _again_." I said this mainly to provoke a glare out of Touya, who except for the occasional death-look hadn't been up to human interaction since I woke up.

We shared a room with two single beds and a cot in one corner, which Touya immediately tumbled into. By his own admission, he hadn't slept at all last night. While he rested, Suyeong and I brought out our portable boards and tried to divine the approaching situation – or at least, confirm that performing divinations was impossible in this area.

"Stationary as the dead," I announced, after about five attempts. "If this isn't the _tengen_, then it's a stronger star-point than either the Shrine or the Pagoda."

"I still don't understand how you and Touya identified the area so quickly," Suyeong said, demonstrating his own inert, failed board. "Isumi told me you had some help from the Honinbou."

I flipped him a smirk. "Trade secret." When he looked disgruntled, I added, "It's not so hard if you think about it in terms of necromantic divination and geomancy. I had some help there – I talked to Shindou's grandfather before we set out from Ki." Suyeong developed that little irritated expression that he sometimes wore when he wasn't following a conversation. I stood up. "Come on, I'll show you." I led Suyeong to the window and opened the blinds. (Touya stirred a little when the daylight fell across his face, but his eyes remained shut.)

Our room overlooked the sea; we had a direct view of the jutting, coniferous peninsula and the extensive stony ruins standing at its end, facing out to ocean. Seagulls cluttered the sky, circling, hovering, buffeted by a wild whistling wind. On the beach immediately below us, a pair of children were making an energetic terrier fetch sticks.

"Pretty cheery, this place, considering what's lying less than a mile away." I nodded at the crumbling remains on the headland. "Old Siwang, former jewel of the Go Empire. The city of the dead."

I could see that Suyeong was making the connections in his head, but was exasperated with my mode of explanation. As far as I could tell, his mode of deduction was systematic, and very linear; I would have questioned his Weiqi abilities if he hadn't proven to be, time and time again, a terrifyingly competent diviner.

I continued: "As far as we can tell, the geomantic board has been used twice, right? First time, to complete the incarnation of Sai in a new body. Second time, by Touya Kouyou – to seal Sai away again." Discussion between Isumi and me had resulted in the conclusion that the land _goban_ itself was the only one powerful enough to have destroyed Sai – which meant that the Meijin had died in Old Siwang, somewhere within those massive rotting buildings. I had yet to broach the subject with Touya Akira. "And now a third time, by Shindou, who's trying to pull Sai's spirit back from the realm of the dead. That's the hardest feat of the three by far. Even the greatest diviner on the continent" – and Shindou wasn't yet a contender for the title, surely-- "would have trouble managing that without being able to take advantage of, ah, a certain weakness in the barrier between life and death."

My backpack was sitting in the wardrobe. I went there to retrieve my copy of the divination record that Touya and I had made the night before last. I handed it to Suyeong to study: _The city that watches ocean. Death by water, death by fire, death by air._

Old Siwang was a staple of our history textbooks. Abandoned due to plague in the pre-Imperial Age, fifteen hundred years ago; resettled some two centuries later, only to fall to a tsunami during the cultural and economic peak of the Go Empire. Finally it'd been sacked and burned by the Yihian conquerors, to whom it'd occurred that the site itself might be inauspicious – hence the establishment of modern Siwang, the modest town in which our motel was located.

"I reckon there's at least a couple hundred revenants haunting those mouldy old structures." I flopped back on the bed closest to the window. "What do you think?"

Whatever Suyeong _thought_, it was clear that he _felt_ considerable unhappiness at the idea. I'd have laughed at him a little more, if I weren't so discomfited myself.

At least Touya didn't seem like the sort to be afraid of ghosts.

Right on cue, Touya struggled upright, yawning.

"How late is it?" he asked, fumbling around for his watch. He found it next to his pillow, checked the time, and glowered at me. "I told you to wake me after an hour--"

"Details, details." I waved airily. "There's plenty of daylight left. How about we go shopping for anti-nausea drugs before we leave?"

The desire to argue flitted across his face, then dissolved as he sagged in exhaustion. "Whatever you like," he said sulkily.

It was almost endearing. "Just kidding." I beamed, holding up a small pill bottle. "I stopped by a pharmacy just after we checked-in. Not that you need to express your gratitude or anything."

"...Thank you." He said it like it would be breaking some fundamental law of the universe not to say the words. His movements were lethargic but determined as he got dressed and gathered his things.

I remained seated on the bed, waiting, trying not to feel sheer panic.

It was time.

#

One of the locals took us out to the peninsula. Touya did not vomit, or even look nauseous, which I considered a great success. Unfortunately I was feeling too ill myself to appreciate the small victory.

Until today I'd never realised just how much I _didn't_ want to see Shindou.

Luckily I was given no time to dwell on the fact. The young woman manning the boat for us steered between some viciously pointed rocks, then came to a standstill, about five yards away from the beach proper (a sliver of sand really, hardly a _proper_ beach). We were apparently supposed to disembark here.

I'd picked my attire in anticipation of getting soaked, and Touya's loose, cottony outfit coped with the task just as effectively; Suyeong's jeans, however, did not fare as well. The girl agreed to pick us up at sunset. We waded our way up to dry sand, and, while Suyeong was indignantly wringing his clothes dry, stared at the silhouette of Siwang looming on a low cliff above us.

Time had eroded the land and exposed the city to the edge of the sea. It was walled, elevated, and turreted, built from sand-coloured stone that was gradually eroding. We wandered up a precarious path leading from the seashore to Siwang's main entrance – a gaping hole that had evidently once been filled by metal gates.

"There's a temple at the heart of this place," Touya said. "The priests there were divination specialists right up till the end of the imperial age. It's most likely that the focal point is there."

Suyeong frowned. "So we go there, and then--?"

"Destroy the continental _goban_. It's not hard to do; any one of us could manage it. But the city might collapse when the board breaks." Touya paused. "It would be safer for me to go alone."

"No way," I said flatly, just as Suyeong answered, "I don't think that'd be a good idea."

Touya opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again, appearing to realise the futility of changing our minds. I refrained from pointing out that I was considerably more athletic than he was, in addition to _not being sick_, and was probably the only one among us three with a hope in hell of outrunning a building that was falling apart.

We entered the city.

Inside was a world of caved-in shops, broken pediments, lichened statues, bright weeds growing from between shattered cobblestones. Old Siwang was far more extensive than it appeared when viewed from a distance – somehow I'd expected to just waltz in and find Shindou waiting.

"This could take a while," Suyeong commented.

"The temple should be due south of here." Touya treaded his way across a long stretch of rubble and into a narrow, shadowy alley. "Walk faster."

Seabirds had nested in the belfries and towers of Siwang, and their raucous cries echoed over us as we stepped through the lonely streets. Their noise was comfortingly alive – apart from ourselves and the occasional bug, I'd yet to notice anything animate on the city floor.

I'd just spotted the temple in the distance, with its curved tiered roofs and decorative figures on its ridges that were probably imperial-style phoenixes, when the air around us began to crackle.

The world rained fire.

Bright drops fell and seared my bare arms. A cry escaped Suyeong's lips. I whirled, looking for cover, and instead saw a man about my age, sitting lazily on the worn rooftop of a nearby house, a _goban_ beside him.

As I lifted my gaze, he smiled and picked a stone off his Weiqi board. The drizzle of flame stopped abruptly.

The name that Suyeong had called out moments earlier finally registered in my mind: _Yeongha_.

Ko Yeongha and I exchanged glances, tried, and found each other wanting. He was handsome in an obnoxiously obvious way, with a titian sweep of hair that fell to his waist.

Once more, Yeongha moved the stones on the _goban_ at his side, and a perfect circle of fire rose up around us, dancing and flickering in heat.

"Waya. Lend me your magnetic board," Touya said sharply. I passed it to him. The nine-by-nine set was still dripping seawater; when he flipped it open, the white and black rounds fell out in clumps and left wet stains on the dusty ground.

Kneeling, Touya placed three stones on the board; the fiery enclosure disappeared.

Ko Yeongha looked rather impressed.

I'd had quite enough of this. I saw a rock at my feet, picked it up, and hurled it through the air, aimed at the centre of Yeongha's brow. About three feet short of its target, the missile imploded into a hundred stone fragments.

"He's got a kind of chaos shield around him," Touya said, still fiddling with my _goban_. "Just give me some time to break it apart--"

"Let me do this," said Suyeong, in a tone that brooked no discussion. "This is what I came here for."

Suyeong had brought out his own portable board (nineteen-by-nineteen), and was unfolding it. "I'm going to create a distraction," he told us. "The moment it comes, you two make a break for it. Find Shindou."

"Okay," I said quickly, before Touya could protest. "It's a sensible plan." I had a feeling that Suyeong was pissed off at me for launching a direct physical attack on Yeongha and was trying to preclude me from doing worse, but it was hardly the right situation for hashing out niceties.

Yeongha watched with an amused expression – the kind I would rather have liked to strangle off his face – as Touya and I packed up the magnetic set and Suyeong began setting out his own layout of stones. He appeared to be waiting to see what we would do next.

He didn't have to wait long. Within minutes Suyeong tossed a final stone out, making the formation rattle and spin – and flooding my entire field of vision with a white burning light.

I grasped Touya's hand and ran towards the south.

Some rather impressive explosions followed our departure, judging from the sounds. I didn't stop running until we were a good several hundred yards away from where we'd encountered Yeongha. As soon as we halted Touya began gasping for air.

"You went too fast," he said, when he'd finished being out of breath.

"We had to get out of there before he noticed we were leaving. You kept up, didn't you? Barely." He was too winded to retort. I hid my amusement and took stock of our surroundings instead, then whistled. "Well, it looks like we're here."

Touya turned in the direction of my gaze. Suddenly he went very still.

A moment later, so did I.

The temple rising up before us was set on a raised granite platform, with a massive set of shallow steps leading to its entrance. Five red roofs crowned its exterior, each featuring faded, shattered ceramic dragons. Part of the front wall had been smashed into a spread rubble that spilled right into the courtyard we were standing in.

Someone had emerged from the broken hole in the wall and was now descending the steps towards us.

It was Shindou Hikaru.

"Hello," he said. "I've been waiting for you."


	10. Chapter 10

The temple was surprisingly bare on the inside. Over the centuries its fixtures and furnishings had been looted and salvaged, its statues stolen and melted down, its precious metals painstakingly scraped off the murals and altars to which they belonged. Thanks to the breach in the building's facade the entry hall was windswept, but Shindou walked right on without a pause, leading us to a musty, smaller chamber further in. There were no features of note in this room save for some small high windows and a _goban_ approximately the size of a pool table. The grid was marked out in deep grooves; fist-sized stones sat at certain intersections.

It was here that Shindou halted, waiting, giving me the impression that he expected us to do something. His face was unhealthily pale, his cheeks heartbreakingly thin. A jet-dark veil of hair hung across his shoulders, unkempt.

"You divined our coming?" Touya asked. Like me, he'd been transfixed by Shindou since Shindou first appeared.

"The ghosts told me." Shindou gave an indifferent wave. I realised with a faint sense of horror that he still retained his ability to talk to spirits. "Can't really do old-fashioned divination around here until Sai comes back."

Touya flushed. "About that, Shindou, I --"

"Don't try to stop me."

Touya spoke steadily: "I'm afraid I can't do that."

They stared at each other in the semi-gloom and I watched them. A kind of helplessness hung in the air, a stalemate.

Shindou lifted his hand in the beginnings of a half-hearted gesture, then let it fall. "I'm sorry about your father," he said. "I buried him out the back."

"Did you bury Sai there as well?" I asked.

Shindou laughed bitterly. "Sai didn't need burying. He just turned into nothing, and went away. One moment he was beside me, the next he was gone. Then I came back here and found Touya Meijin dead. I'm sorry," he said again to Touya.

I snorted. "Yeah, your collateral damage has been rather massive these few months." My voice came out precise and cool, the complete antithesis of how I felt.

A slight spark came into his eyes. "It would have worked fine, the first time! If you'd just given us the time!"

"That wasn't my choice!" Defensiveness flared through me. "Ogata-sensei turned up. That attempt of yours was doomed from the beginning! Besides," I lowered my tone, "If we could go back, I'd act differently. I wouldn't have let you go ahead. The dead don't live again. That's just reality."

"And who said that they shouldn't? The living? That's only because they don't know what it's like to be dead."

"And you? Do you know? Do you _really_ know? Screw that, you have no idea. Do you think just hanging out with ghosts qualifies you to understand what it's like? If you really did, you wouldn't have allowed three people to be killed over this."

"That wasn't intentional. It was just a side-effect--"

"_But they died_." I couldn't even tell if my words were reaching him. One thing for sure: it was hurting me like crazy to tell him these things. I loved Shindou, maybe more than I loved Isumi – or maybe it was one of those things that couldn't be ranked or compared. Shindou needed me – or at least needed _someone_. Isumi didn't.

"You understand," he said desperately to Touya. "You _understand_, don't you?"

"Shut up," I cut Touya off before he could respond. "This is not about understanding or not understanding. I don't give a damn how important Sai was to you."

Anger suffused his cheeks with colour. That was better. It made this entire charade feel less like puppy-kicking. But he could not sustain the emotion long. Fatigue covered his countenance again.

He was not capable of resisting us. Touya was beginning to realise it as well.

"Is this the place?" Touya asked. "The _tengen_?"

Shindou looked up. "You can't – you're not going to--"

"We are," I said calmly.

There was a pile of black and white rocks piled up in the corner. The divination pieces. Touya walked across and picked up a dark stone. Shindou followed him over.

"Don't do this. Just give me a month to finish. For Sai. Please."

Touya ignored him. Shindou turned to me in appeal.

"Waya, I _can't_."

"I know," I said softly. "That's why we're going to make the decision for you."

Shindou tried to wrench the stone out of Touya's hands. I moved swiftly forward and punched Shindou in the stomach.

"Do it," I growled at Touya, as Shindou staggered backwards. "Break the the damn board and we'll get out of here."

Six stones. That was all it took, I knew, to break the _tengen_, send the continent into chaos. Shindou pulled himself upwards, energised by panic, and launched himself at Touya. I struck him again, this time in the face, and moved to pull him into a pinhold.

"I hate you," he hissed at me, after I'd forced him to the ground, twisting his elbow painfully. Shit. He'd always been able to push my buttons way better than Isumi could.

"Hurry up a little," I snapped at Touya, despite the fact that Touya was already going about the task rather efficiently.

"Almost done," he said, putting another two pieces down. His remark was glacial, composed; it was this more than any discomfort I was inflicting that caused Shindou to cease resisting.

Again Touya squatted, picked up a white round stone from the pile, then reached out with both hands and placed it right in the centre of the _goban_.

Without letting go of the piece he'd just placed, he said, "Shindou, you didn't--"

Then the earth began to break apart.

#

Shindou lost consciousness beneath me just as dust began to seep from the ceiling. Cursing, I hauled him up and dragged him across my shoulders. He was light as a girl, possibly malnourished even.

Touya was still paralysed in front of the board. "_Move_," I told him. "You're the one who told us what was going to happen when the geomantic board blew."

He pointed at the formation in front of us. "Shindou, he ---"

"If we don't go _now_, we won't be alive to appreciate it." I made for the door before he could reply, and felt him following me.

Out in the entrance hall, there were fragments falling, and cracks appearing in the floor and pillars. We hurried along as quickly as I could manage while carrying Shindou, although he was an easy burden to carry; frighteningly easy, in fact.

Suyeong and Yeongha were waiting in the courtyard outside. They both looked rather scorched and singed, but otherwise fine.

"We need to go south," said Suyeong, "to the forest, before the city turns to debris."

I nodded.

We ran. All around us, ancient Siwang fell to pieces.

#

Late afternoon. The smell of pine needles and powdered stone. Through the gaps between treetops I could see the thick sand-coloured haze that the destruction of the ruins had created in the atmosphere. I was too tired to comment on it, or even make the slightest movement. I remained supine on the forest floor, hands outstretched, Shindou lying next to me. He had yet to rouse from his faint.

Touya was speaking to Yeongha in Dukian.

"What are they talking about?" I asked Suyeong.

"He's asking whether Yeongha knows where Touya Meijin is buried."

"Oh." Briefly, I wondered what Touya intended to do with Shindou now he'd found him again. Press charges? Murder by geomantic divination. That'd make a fantastic tabloid headline. It'd even be true. Weariness fell over me. I still wanted to protect Shindou – but from what, now that I'd prevented him from getting the only thing he'd ever wanted?

Somewhere out there the Pagoda of the Nine Stars was dissipating, the Shrine of Darkness was being torn into pieces, and the Council House of Ki with it. The Hill of Flowers was burning, perhaps. It'd taken the collapse of Siwang for me to realise what a crazy, dangerously easy thing we'd set out to do. No wonder Shindou hadn't thought of what he was doing as murder.

Touya finished his conversation with Yeongha and came up to me. "I'm going to visit my father," he said. "Will you join me? Suyeong says he'll watch over Shindou."

I eyed Yeongha warily, but it wasn't as if he could cause much more magical havoc than we'd _already_ caused, so I clambered to my feet reluctantly. I walked with Touya further up the hill, into the forest, until we reached a glade where the grass was sparse, the soil dark and ruddy.

There was a small boulder there with a few bunches of wildflowers on it, and in front of it, a long mound of earth packed loosely.

Touya knelt before the grave. After a moment, so did I.

"Will you have him moved back to Ki?" I asked.

"Probably. I hadn't thought about that yet. I was just busy wondering about – I was just realising that my father made a judgement, when he came here. He decided that Sai was something that shouldn't be allowed to exist."

I recalled the luminous eyes, the breathtakingly exquisite face, the voice Isumi had heard and spoken with, that I would never hear now. "And? Do you disagree with him?"

"I don't know," he answered. "But whatever my opinion, I don't think I'd have been willing to die for it."

The wind sighed in the boughs overhead.

"Do you want to be alone?" I offered.

He shook his head. "Not today. Let's go back."

We returned to the edge of the forest, our footsteps slow. I felt strangely solitary and disconnected from him – as if we couldn't mourn together, as if there were a universe of difference between the pain in his heart and the regret in mine. Perhaps there was.

"There's something I need to tell you," Touya spoke after a period of silence "About Shindou. That board, he adjusted it so that he would..." He trailed off.

Suyeong was yelling at Yeongha in Dukian, and Yeongha was shouting back. We could hear their voices; a few paces later we came out from behind a massive fir tree and they spotted us. Yeongha looked extremely pissed. Suyeong came over and stared at us accusingly.

"He doesn't remember," he said angrily. "He doesn't remember anything."

I looked over Suyeong's shoulder to see Shindou – pallid, emaciated, sitting upright on a fallen tree trunk. His huge green eyes flickered up to scrutinise us curiously.

"Who are you?" he asked, before frowning. "I'm afraid I don't know what my name is right now."

I was too shocked to react. But Touya came forward and leaned down to clasp Shindou's hand, the gesture curiously gentle.

"Your name is Shindou Hikaru," he said, his face quite inscrutable. "And you're – you're a friend of ours."

"Was I?"

END. DICE IN A GAME OF WAR.


End file.
